Food for Thought.
I take the bus to work every morning. I get off at a mall, and walk through it to the office park just behind.
First a few things about the Moorestown Mall. It’s Small, Maybe 40 retail spaces in all, and of those forty, a good fifth are empty. Foot traffic in the mall is pretty bad. Its 5 miles from the Cherry Hill Mall, one of the best malls in a 100+ mile radius. I think it’s safe to say that the Mall’s days are numbered, well in my opinion at least.
A handful of months ago, ‘Bubby’s Brisket’ opened up in the Food Court. Other than a pretty bad menu, and a really bad name, the place looked fine. I never eat in the food court, so I have no idea what their food was like, but whatever, its besides the point. My point is that today, maybe 8 months after it opened, I was walking through, and they were shuttering the place up.
I can’t help but be sad. Someone spent a lot of time, energy and money into opening up that shop. They created all of the dishes, put together a menu, hired a staff, the whole 9. But through poor planning, and no doubt a cost cutting decision to open in the Moorestown Mall instead of say Cherry Hill, or a stand alone shop, they had no chance.
Lessons Learned (from my independent assessment):
- Hire a Graphic Artist.
No amount of praise from family and friends will allow me to be a successful graphic artist. - Don’t make crazy important decisions without doing my homework.
Where I decided to Open my doors is probably one of the most important decisions I will have to make as an aspiring shop owner. Cost matters, but its not worth opening at all, if I’m just going to be closing up shop in 8 months due to a poor location. - Fight.
I walk through the mall on my way home almost everyday during the aftershool lets-go-to-the-mall-and-avoid-homework hours of 4-5pm. there are more people that are going to be eating in the food court then than almost any other time of the day (my opinion). I always see the standard mall Asian food chains out sampling these dishes and passing out menu, and all that. The result, they had a line, and poor Bubby did not. I don’t know what her owners were thinking, but if your competition is doing something that works, at least emulate. But even better, take that idea, and make it better. Pass out coupons, bigger samples, I don’t care, anything.
Anyways. many more businesses fail than make it. I might as well dissect what I see, so that I can attempt to learn from others mistakes.