If you love food and feel like you want to make it a career, you might consider opening up your own grocery. For many, that’s exactly what they’ve done. Groceries, when operated well, can bring in huge profits. Plus, you can work with food and be your own boss. It’s an exciting choice, and everybody needs to eat, meaning that the potential market is enormous.
That said, you should never attempt to start any business, including a grocery store, without doing a bit of research first. There are several things you need to consider and steps you need to take before you can open up and be successful. Here is a guide to what it takes to open a grocery store.
Table of Contents
Create a Business Plan
Before you open your grocery store, you will need to make an investment. You can’t have a grocery store without any product, and you can’t fabricate food after customers come. You need it ahead of time. For most people, this would mean having investors shoulder some of the load. However, it can be hard to find investors at the best of times, and close to impossible if you don’t have a business plan.
A business plan is an outline of everything you are going to do with your business. It should have revenue projections, cost analyses, and marketing plans. You need something that will not just provide you with guidance on moving forward, but also impress potential investors enough to sign on the dotted line.
Of course, the fact that it will help guide everything you do going forward is crucial, too. Going into any business without a plan, especially a grocery store business, could spell disaster.
Market Research
Part of your business plan should be detailing how you are going to get your sales. This is a big part of why doing your market research is so important. If you aren’t doing anything different from other existing grocery stores, then why should customers choose you?
Your market research should involve looking at every aspect of the grocery store industry and market in your area. Is there a gap in a certain place when it comes to grocery store coverage? Maybe there is a place for a grocery store that sells specialty foods. Whatever it is, make sure that your grocery store is going to fill a need and give customers a reason to shop with you.
Insurance
When you are planning out your costs, do not forget about insurance. It is up to you to protect your business, your customers, and your staff from injury and property damage. The fact is that having a grocery store means there are several risks that you need to be concerned about. You could have hundreds of customers coming through every day, and any one of them could get injured. No matter what precautions you take, someone could trip, or slip on the contents of a jar that had just been dropped on the floor. When that happens, you could be sued. Your grocery store insurance should provide you with protection for client injuries and property damage, workers compensation, product insurance, and commercial vehicle insurance at the very least. Make sure you talk to your broker or insurance provider about what coverages will make sense.
Choose a Great Location
Choosing a location might be the most important decision you make when planning out your new grocery store. If you put it in the wrong place you could be setting yourself up for failure. The wrong place could mean one where you’re surrounded by other established grocery stores, for instance. Or, it might be that you are so far away from a population center that very few people will make the trek to you
However, if you are offering foods that nobody else in your area is providing, then you might want to have a central location, regardless of what other stores are nearby. This will ensure that a larger amount of people can get to you, or perhaps they will stop by after shopping at a conventional grocery store.
Get a Good Team in Place
When you are starting out in any business, your margin for error is thin. You can’t afford to have many mistakes, and that includes with your hiring. Having high turnover right off the bat could end up sinking your business before you know it. Make sure that you have the best possible team in place. If you know a good person, but the timing doesn’t quite work, use your initial investment to start paying them prior to opening.
Your team should mesh well together and be comfortable with you as a leader. Grocery stores involve a wide range of talent, from accounting, to inventory, to food expertise, to customer service, and more. Make sure that you have a diverse team that you can trust to help you grow your business to where you want it to be.
Technology
You will also need to invest in the technology that you will use. For instance, you will have to have an inventory with scanning guns. Try out different products to find one that works for your business, or that can be customized to do so. You will also need point-of-sale technology. You could go with a standard cash register and debit machine combination. You might also want a self-serve option for your customers. Just make sure that whatever you choose you have the customer in mind at all times. You want their experience to be great, especially when you are trying to establish yourself.
If you love working with food, leading a team, and working hard for yourself, then opening a grocery store might be a great point to you. However, there are some things you need to consider and take care of ahead of time before you can open up. Failure to handle everything ahead of time could lead to disaster down the road. Use this list and make sure that you have everything covered before you open your grocery store business.
