We plan on focusing on one venue at first then branching out to other areas to market to. This way we can focus our attention on what works for the particular market we're working with. What works in one market will not necessarily work in another. We have learned that from our online ventures over the past several years. Hopefully we can secure a spot at one of the local recreation areas/mall in our area. It is an outdoor mall concept that is very popular in many of the bigger cities. I believe the outdoor mall concept is the wave of the future, as I've mentioned several weeks ago. I actually like the outdoor mall better than the enclosed mall it just seems much less depressing. I was in our local mall today and I am just surprised that is still open. A lot of the malls similar to this one are closed in medium-sized cities. I walked around and just feel depressed, there's no light coming in and looks dated it is just overall not appealing to me. I believe outdoor mall concept is dying quicker than most people believe. There is a spot open in the mall that would be interesting to put one of our doughnuts shops in, and I would not even begin to imagine how much that would cost. If we were going to do something like this it would be in the center aisle of the mall where there is the most traffic. But like I've mentioned before, I just do not believe this is a good idea. We are going to stay away from malls. The place we are talking about putting in downtown Huntington is basically a concession cart. If the rent is not too high that we may be able to pull it off.

If this does not work we are thinking about marketing to churches. We are going to get a database of churches and send a mailing telling them that we will set up shop in their church and sell our doughnuts. We can split the profits equally and still be ahead. I think there is a lot of money and selling doughnuts to churches, especially at their social events. I am very eager to market to this group of people. I think it will be very interesting, to see what happens. In the end marketing is a very important part of your business plan. Be sure you have a good marketing plan as well as a business plan before you start in your ventures.

You may have often thought about starting your own business and all of the perks that come along with it. You could take advantage of the tax to deductions, Be your own boss, and all of the other things that you always hear about working from home or having your own business. It is true, when you work for yourself you do not give Uncle Sam an interest-free loan while you earn money, you pay the tax man after you have already earned it and take out your deductions. The doughnut business could afford you a lot of deductions and peace of mind knowing that doughnuts will always be in demand and people love them. But you question the timing of starting your own business. You have reason to be afraid, change is always a hard thing to do.

You have all of these things going through your head, But how could you live with yourself if your family lost their home and their life savings because of your business venture. That would be a very difficult pill to swallow, especially if you have a family. You feel trapped and go to work daily Thinking about the way life could be. It is much easier to be told what to do and how to do it than venture out on your own and try to make something of a business. You have probably heard all the horror stories of opening up a food related business. One of the good things about having a donut business, especially a small donut business, is you are selling one product and the overhead can be quite low. We will talk more about that in a bit. Stay tuned tomorrow and we will continue our discussion about starting a good business end is poor economy.