Marketing

We don't plan to spend much funds on marketing. We'll put up signage over the storefront -- as required by the landlady -- and on the plaza-sign post, build a basic website, and create a Facebook page. We won't bother with print ads or coupons.  We don't expect any amount of marketing to make our shop a destination spot.  We're assuming most people won't travel long distances for a smoothie.    

As mentioned before, we envision our smoothie shop is a parasitic business that will primarily draw its customers from 24 Hour Fitness users. Our assumption is that 24 Hour Fitness provides us with a self-selecting customer base that doesn't need to be convinced to purchase nutritious smoothies.  They just need to be served well and provided with smoothies that meet their nutritional and taste expectations.

Of course, we'd like to attract those who aren't gym members and we'll eventually work toward diversifying our customer base. But we're concerned that focusing on satisfying too many types of customers may dilute our brand and negatively impact those interested in health and nutrition. For instance, we could offer bubble tea (not healthy) but we haven't figured out a way to offer such drinks without impacting our reputation as a health food shop.  

Another consideration is our lack of experience with such an operation.  We don't know how to minimize labor costs and to control risk.  We need time to figure out how to cost-efficiently best serve our core customers .  We initially can't handle too many different kinds of customers.  And ultimately, we want to attract more customers not by catering to those who aren't concerned about the nutritional qualities of a smoothie, but by making more people aware of how a smoothie that contains 4 servings of fresh fruit can positively impact the quality of their lives while reducing their cost of living.

Why We Started a Smoothie Shop

We've always wanted to start a restaurant because we're foodies.  We love thinking about ways to produce food.  We enjoy cooking for and serving guests.  We care about nutrition and health.  We want to know what it takes to cost-efficiently maximize nutritional intake.  We wonder about the relationship between ecology and food preparation.  We're interested in agricultural trade and production.  We fantasize about introducing new foods.  And we're preachy and idealistic -- we want to reduce obesity in the US vis-a-vis expanding people's palates and knowledge about food and nutrition. 

We've talked about starting a restaurant for years but never had the courage to do so.  We were concerned about the financial risk involved and the loss of paid vacation time that comes with working a salaried job.  We couldn't imagine closing shop to visit family and our favorite destinations.  It seems that restaurant owners get at most two weeks off per year. We weren't prepared to make the sacrifices to start a restaurant.  

We're starting this smoothie shop more out of necessity than luxury or courage.  Andrew got laid off and found it difficult to find a job that compensates enough to pay the bills (don't become a writer, or be a really good one!).  We got to a point where we decided that the potential benefits of starting a smoothie business outweighed its risks. It was either be "poor" or take a risk.  The threat of "poverty" motivated us to take a calculated risk and to pursue what we've always wanted. For us, necessity is a powerful motivator. 

 Why a smoothie shop?  We can't start a restaurant because we don't have the experience or credibility to do so, even if some consider us good cooks and we've won the two Rusty Chef (private cooking competitions) we've competed in.  Preparing a meal for 50 isn't the same as making one for eight.  Neither of us have worked in restaurant operations since adolescence.  We're not familiar with food-prep work-flow processes, which involves figuring out cost-effective ways to deal with issues like perishability of produce and labor-time.

A smoothie shop offers the ideal setting for us to learn about food work-flow processes without taking on the risk involved in opening a restaurant.  Smoothie shops don't require expensive vents and cooking equipment; a sandwich prep station, a couple blenders, and a refrigerator are all that's needed (or so we think).  Smoothie shops also aren't labor intensive to run as, say, a 40 seat restaurant.  We lose nothing more than our own labor-time if we don't sell anything for an hour.  With a 40 seat restaurant, we could be losing $100 an hour in labor costs if we don't have business.  A smoothie operation is the ideal bridge to a restaurant operation.

And we're not smoothie novices.  We've been making 2 smoothies per day for years.  We know how to make a smoothie and consider it an integral part of our diet.  We don't, however, know how to make smoothies for paying customers.

Finally, we found the ideal location for a smoothie shop -- next to a 24 Hour Fitness gym that draws 1000 visitors per day.  As our plumber put it: "with a location like this, you've got to be a fucking idiot to not make this work."