How to buy a Dough Nut and Pastry Shop business

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How to buy a Dough Nut and Pastry Shop business

1/4/2008 - by: Acquireo Team - Director of Marketing, Acquireo.com

To be the successful owner of a donut and pastry shop, a person better be a baker by education and love. If the owner is going to work in the business, the hours will be like a night watchman and a milkman. The baking has to be completed in the early hours of the morning in order to be able to serve freshly baked products. The donuts and the pastries are the specialty of the house, so the quality and product choices have to be a reasonable number. The customers are willing to pay for something different as long as it is an exquisite, tasty and an experience.

This is a fairly high markup business and satisfied customers become repeat customers that come back week after week. It is possible to grow the business with coupons and special deals for customers that buy certain dollar amounts. Another way to make customers happy is to give them a reward for referrals to new customers. The best way with out a doubt is to consistently deliver the best donuts and pastry in the area.

Start a new or buy an old

The potential owner of a donut shop or pastry shop has to come early to the decision of whether to start a new shop or buy an old one. At Acquireo.com the potential buyer can find shops that are listed for sale and business brokers that will help them find a business that is for sale. One of the best reasons to consider buying a shop that is in existence is the clients are already use to shopping at the business. If the new owner can keep up the quality and even add more selections, the clientele will continue to buy from the business. This means that the shop does not need to go through the growing curve that a new business must endure. Immediate cash flow will also help the new owner recover the investment at a quicker pace. This big plus in buying a business is offset somewhat by the higher price that an established business will command. A buyer has to pay for the good will the company has developed over time.

When a new business like this bakery shop is started, the owner must consider many factors that will seriously affect the business during its startup phase. Aside from the money needed to buy equipment and obtain a business location, the owner must also figure on a reasonable amount of money that will be needed to advertise the business. A new business has a serious problem. Their potential customers do not know it is open for business without this advertising blitz. This can be a very healthy expense for a business with few customers. Advertising can be done in many ways, such as, mailed coupons, TV ads, radio spots and picking a location with tremendous foot traffic.

Another big expense for this type of business is the cost of the equipment needed to open the doors. Kitchen equipment can be purchased either new or used. Careful shopping is what is needed when doing this equipment buying.

A smart move when opening the shop with a new owner or from scratch is this. Come up with a new customer welcome special that brings the customers into the shop. This could be for example a dozen and a half for the price of a dozen.

If you plan to have a series of new products for your customers, you could announce them in flyers that are given with the purchase or in your ad campaign.

Business brokers can be very helpful with this part of the business plan, as they may have seen an idea that really worked well for one of their customers. It never hurts to ask them if they have seen anything in the way of advertising that captured customers. This source could also be useful in finding used equipment.

Working and negotiating the deal

When you find the perfect business to buy, you want to make a deal that works. Most businesses of this type can usually be purchased with some help from the old owner. This means simply that the old owner will take part of the purchase price in payments. If this is the case, the price of the business will increase over the price of an all cash deal. Another important part of this purchase is the ability to get help and training from the old owner. If you have the baking knowledge this may be as simple as learning any special recopies that the old owner has. It also would help to see the routine the shop used on a daily basis to have the fresh products out each morning. This business is all about freshness and this does not happen by accident. Preparation and planning go into efficiently doing this operation on a daily basis. A new owner should not be put in the place of having to reinvent the wheel. A cooperative previous owner will make this part of the deal go through with ease.

Conclusion

High profit margins are available in this type of business. If the owner is heavily involved in the business, the profit can be substantial. The biggest problem the owner has to overcome, once the customers are coming through the door is the time that is needed to run this type of business. The baking has to be done at night and the store needs to be open in the daytime. Finding and keeping good employees will help with this problem, but it is a problem that must be resolved.

The owner cannot do all of the work by himself or herself or they will burn out. The family can be help or finding good help can solve this problem.

Finding a business that has a good following that is up for sale at a price you can afford is going to take some time and serious investigation. If a deal can be found, the deal must still be fair to both parties or it could cause a problem later in the business. Buying a business has to make sense from a financial perspective or it should be passed on and forgotten.

Looking for buying a donut business? We have it all here Donut Businesses for sale -Acquireo.com.
If you are looking for similar businesses, the ones listed below will be all you need:


author: Acquireo Team

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