Posts Tagged ‘donut business’
Happy Belated Donut Day and Update on What We Are Doing
June 5th, 2010 | 
Author: Happy belated donut day everyone.... here is a video update of what we have been up to and where we are headed with us....
Be sure to check out MyConcessionBusiness.com
The Importance of a Marketing Plan
We talked last week the importance of having a business plan for your doughnut shop business. It is also equally important to have a plan for marketing. We touched on this briefly a few months ago but would like to discuss it in more detail and in our post today.
Your overall marketing plan should cover 3 to 6 months. You need to determine how much money you're going to commit to marketing your doughnut business. You also will determine how the money will best be spent and be realistic on your goals. After this you will need to determine your target market. Where are you going to sell your donuts and to whom. Who are the people that are most likely to buy your product? Do they have families? Does it matter how much money they make? You do not want to answer every one to these questions. Everyone is not who your target market is, do not fool yourself into thinking this, it is a mistake that a lot of people make. Target different people with different marketing, most of the big companies do this. Your marketing will be different to college students that will be to stay-at-home moms.
Think about how you're going to reach these people, are you going to use a mailing list? Are you going to put an ad in the paper? Are you going to give away free samples? Putting an ad in the paper or using a mailing list could be a start in getting the word out for your donut business. Especially if you want to set up shop there and sell them at their venue, i.e. their church, school or whatever. If you decide to use a mailing list, narrow it down as much as possible. You can buy mailing list of all the churches in your town. A lot of times they will even mail the postcards or letter for you. Don't buy from the first-person that tries to sell you a mailing list, you could get burned very quickly. Pay attention to your marketing, it can mean the success or failure of your business.
Posted in Marketing | 
Tags: donut business, how to start a donut business, Marketing, marketing plan, Starting a Donut Business | 
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Getting to Know Your Customers
The donut business is like any other business and it is important that you get to know your customers. The more information that you have about what they like and don't like the more money you will make and the less money that you will spend on trying to find out that information. One of the best ways to get know your customers, and this is assuming that you have started your donut business already, is to ask for feedback. We are also assuming that you are catering to small groups of people and doing what we are doing and selling small doughnuts. We also assuming that you do not have a large franchise donut shop. But this will work for those as well.
There's several things you should do to get customer feedback. There's so many companies to ask for feedback from the customers but do not supply an easy way for the customers to give them that feedback. The first thing you should do is make it easy for the customer to give you feedback. Supply them with a pen and paper and simply ask them what they think about your donut business. Provide a website where they can give you feedback on their experience with your company. Maybe reward them for their information. Ask them what you can do to better serve them and provide a forum for them to do that. Take advantage of all the social websites that are available & sign your company up for them.
Organize and track your feedback and let customers know that you plan on resolving complaints and actually respond to their positive and negative feedback. A sickly established a process to adjust each complaint that you receive. Train your employees on soliciting and managing feedback that you get from your customers. The donut business is like any other business and it is important to know what your customers are thinking. A satisfied customer will tell their friends and family about you which will result in much more business. Be smart about your feedback process.
Posted in Business Plans, Marketing |
Tags: customer feedback, donut business, doughnut business, how to start a donut business |
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Importance of Having a Business Plan – Update
I realize we've discussed this before but I found some really good business plans on Ebay the other day and I wanted to share them with you... they are below... a few things to look for when purchasing a donut business plan:
Is it specific to the donut business?
Is it customizable and includes a template?
Does it automatically calculate spreadsheets, tables and graphs?
The above are important to make your life easier when developing your plan.....
Importance of Having a Good Donut Recipe
Having a good donut recipe is important when you first start your donut business. There are many options when you come to this situation. You will need to have a basic donut recipe before you start your business. You may want to look on the Internet and type donut recipe to begin your search. There are many good recipes some good some bad, of course.
We chose to use little orbits recipe that we got off of their website. It actually was not a doughnut recipe but a doughnut mix so that we ordered from their company. It ended up being very good as you can tell from our taste tests in our videos a couple of months ago. We will be trying several different donut recipes in the future and posting them to our blog. We were so impressed with the little orbit's donut recipe That we did not bother to try anything else.
There are several donut recipes on the Internet that we plan on trying in the future. We plan on even making a donut recipes blog so people have somewhere to go to find out more about donut recipes. There's not only a recipe for the donut itself, but recipes for the fillings that go inside of the doughnuts. Some of the fillings are much better than others, as you probably have experienced from going to other doughnut shops. Personally I can really tell a difference in the fillings of different donut shops. If you want to try a very good donut recipe, check out our ad on this blog donutdvd.com. They really guide you on how to start up your donut business And give you training on how what to do. They also give you the all important donut recipe that can be very difficult to find. Is much better to start with something proven, than to try to find something that people like. You may want to check out their website, they have very good donut recipes.
Posted in donut recipes |
Tags: donut business, donut recipe, donutdvd, doughnut business, doughnut recipe |
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Having Business Partners in Your Donut Business
There are advantages and disadvantages to having business partners in the doughnut business. In this post I will discuss the advantages of having business partners. As you know there are four people involved in our doughnut business and thus far it has not been a problem. The four of us are partners and other ventures, beside the doughnut venture, and we have been successful. I am not saying that we do not disagree on things, actually we disagree on a lot of things, but we end up agreeing to disagree. We are lucky that we all give and just enough and realize the role each one of us plays in the business. Respect is an important part of having a business partner and we all respect each other for what and who we are.
Having a business partner is not always a good idea. You really need to know the person and what they are about. How long have you known your potential business partner? Do they have good credit? Do they have money? What do they bring to the table that you do not have? Can you trust this person? Do they have other interests besides what you are trying to do? All these questions need to be answered before you even consider a person to be your business partner. There are many a horror story of partnerships gone bad. One of my business partners Brothers lost over $100,000 in a motorcycle shop business that did not turn out well, basically went out of business. He mortgaged his home for the money and lost every cent of it. There was no recourse against his business partner because he went bankrupt. It is a sad situation but one that he has recovered from nicely. There is no education like experience, though it can be costly.
So you think you have a potential business partner for your fledgling doughnut business? The question is, do you really need him? What are they bringing to the table that you do not have? Maybe it is money that they have and you do not have. If so, you need to spell out exactly what they want in return. Maybe it would be better if they were a silent investor instead of a partner. I have found a lot of times it works better for both parties if one has money and the other doesn't, that's a person who has the money simply invest the money and gets a set rate of return on their cash. Set up a venture capital deal with someone where they get a guaranteed rate of return. You can afford to pay a higher rate of return, make it attractive to a potential investor, especially considering that you could give up 50% of the business if you became partners. Plus the business partner would have control over your business and you would have less of a say than if they were just a venture capital investor.
Having a business partner can Be a good thing or a can be a living nightmare. Do your research on the person and find out how they will fit in to what you are planning on doing with your donut business. A lot of times not making them a business partner but giving them a guaranteed rate of return on their money Is the best thing to do for both parties.
The Downfalls of a Donut Business Franchise
We talked yesterday about the benefits of having a doughnut businessness franchise. Today we will discuss the downfalls of having a doughnut franchise. There are many reasons why going with a franchise may not benefit you or be best for your particular situation. The first reason why having a donut franchise May not be the best idea are the very high startup costs. Not only will you have a high startup costs, but the donut franchise will expect you to have a reasonable cash flow and high net worth. These two things alone will keep many people from being able to afford a donut business franchise. Opening a good business franchise usually requires that you have been successful in either another business or your job. Often times you can pool the resources of a few people in order to meet the requirements. It is never a good idea to get into a business, especially a franchise situation, when you are strapped for cash or do not have your financial affairs in order. Another downfall of the franchise system is you lose some level of control over your business. You will be told when to do it and how to do it, after all is not your brand, and you do not own the brand. If the franchise wants you to change the look of your restaurant, you will have to comply with their request. Anything that the donut franchise would want you to do, you will need to pretty much do what they say. You have little if any control over what they may request. You are at their mercy most of the time. Not only will the donut franchise control how you run your business, but they take a chunk of your revenue as a royalty. This royalty is rarely negotiated and is Told to you up front before you buy into the franchise. The cost of doing business under a donut franchise system is very high. You have the cost of the building, utilities and several employees to be concerned about. We want to keep things small and simple, this is why we are going with the single menu item donut business model. The cost or low end of profits can potentially be very high. When you start having to build buildings and being involved in a franchise it gets very expensive very quickly. You will need much more money in order to survive opening a franchise.
Want to Open a Donut Business? Know Your Startup Costs
Knowing your startup costs for any business venture is always a good idea. As we have previously discussed the capital needed to start a doughnut business can be very low or very high depending on where you are headed in the business. For example, if you want to start a franchise donut business, of course your start up cost will be much higher than if you start a simple one man operation small doughnut business, with one product to sell. You need to be aware of all the costs associated with starting your business, it just makes sense.
Do you know of anyone else in your network of friends or family who have started a business in the past? They are usually an excellent resource and can answer many of your questions for no charge at all. There are many similarities in businesses, so they do not necessarily have to have a donut business in order to give you good advice. There are many things that can suck money out of you, and you want to be aware of each one of them. There are so many unexpected cost in running and starting a business, you want to plan for the unexpected. It is never fun to realize you have unexpected expenses that you must attend to. Pay attention to the people that offer you advice, especially ones that have had their own business. They are an invaluable resource in your future endeavors. Also make sure you are comparing apples to apples, prices in some cities are different, so you need to be sure about licensing and taxes for different areas.
Remember there is no education like experience, you may find out after starting your donut business, that you have found out more by making mistakes on your own. Sometimes education is experience that is what you do with it that matters. Be sure you are aware of everything that goes on in your business, and the less surprises you have, the better off you are.
Benefits of a Donut Franchise
Opening a donut business can be very frustrating and time-consuming. Going at it alone can be intimidating and overwhelming. Although we have made the decision not to invest in a good franchise, we can see where it could be beneficial. The startup cost and net worth requirements are very high for a good donut franchise. Many times you can pool the resources of two or three people to adhere to the requirements of the donut franchise. These requirements can be very high at times.
One thing the doughnut franchise will give you is support and market research. They will also advertise your store and give you a budget for advertising. Of course they will take a royalty from your revenue, but that is the price of doing business. There are few businesses where I would recommend a franchise, but anything having to do with food, is not a terribly bad idea. Another thing that the doughnut franchise will give you his brand recognition. People will be familiar with the brand and will come into your store simply because they are familiar with the doughnuts that the brand sells. You'll be miles ahead of people getting to enjoy your doughnuts. You will not have to spend years of getting the word out about your brand, because it will pretty much already have been done for you. People are very particular when it comes to food, and if you have an established done that franchise to back to you, you'll be way ahead of the competition. The donut franchise will also give you good ideas on where to locate your doughnut business. They will have extensive experience on where to locate the doughnut shop. This experience can prove to be invaluable, and keep you from making big mistakes.
If you have the money to invest, and are financially fit, then the donut franchise model may be best for you. You'll need to look closely into each one, and decide which one best suits your situation. Some of the donut franchises will require a Hands on approach where others will let you simply be an investor. Again you will need to look closely and find out which one best suits your situation.
