That some small businesses are failing because they don’t adapt to the needs of their customers?

[Isawyou]

I try to shop local. Fortunately I do have some great independent places nearby.

What I am finding frustrating is for example the fruit and veg shop closes at 4.30pm. They start packing up at 3.45pm and it is really difficult to buy things from there where they are stacking all the stands with the produce inside. They also look unhappy at customers coming to buy at packing up time. It is easier to go to the Tesco express that stays open until midnight.

Other shops do not open until 10am and close early. So I can’t get there before work or after work.

They complain their businesses are not doing well and people do not shop local but they are not exactly facilitating it for the customers either.

Our local fish and chip shops take cards, I live in a seaside town so we have a few. I was amazed when I found out that the ice cream vendors on the sea front also take cards, somehow I thought they would be cash only.

The chains and Amazon have their place but if you want your small local business to be a constant in your community you need to understand this stuff and make allowances when it doesn't measure up against Costa or Amazon or whoever.

There are two groups of non-customers, though: those who don't want to use your shop and those who are simply not available to do so during limited opening hours (OK, there's a third group - people who fall into both of the other two).

The first group are never going to be relevant to your business; but the second group is a potentially untapped source. However much people may desperately want you to stay in the community, if they could only use you by taking annual leave, it's just not going to fly.

Quite often, people will acknowledge that the big chains are not the best, but they are open. Do you choose the OK-ish one that you are able to buy, or the amazing one that you can't?! It's a bit like the retail equivalent of going for Mr Right-Now, because Mr Right never seems to turn up!

Have you actually read the Hippocratic Oath (which most doctors don’t take anyway, incidentally).

It says nothing about late night opening. Spends a lot of time wanging on about not treating kidney stones.

It is fine for the small businesses to have their own circumstances for why they can’t open longer but there is no point getting angry that people are choosing to shop elsewhere then.

The fruit and veg shop I mentioned starts packing up at 3.45 so therefore misses the after school and work customers. Yes he may not want to open later and that is fine but no point him getting angry that people are choosing to go to the fruit and veg place that opened nearby and opens a couple of late evenings a week. They close one day in the week to compensate.

People do want to support their local businesses but they are not going to leave work early just so they can go and buy from him because he wants to start packing up at 3.45.

They will cater mainly for trade so wont care that you cant get there.

It is not just opening later. It is listening to the customer and fulfilling their needs. What do you offer that no one else does? How do you go the extra mile? Are you keeping up with new trends and adjusting accordingly? Is what you sell a niche product?

The new fruit and veg that opened near me offer free kids for apples, have a free water bottle refilling station, free recipe ideas leaflet, open late a couple of evenings a week, they have started selling hot soup among many more ideas. They are constantly changing and adapting and they are doing a roaring trade while the other fruit and veg place that packs up at 3.45 complains that people refuse to shop local.

My GPs open at 7.30am,close at 7pm Monday Friday and 8am-1.30pm on a Saturday. It's a fantastic practice,amd has two surgeries in the town. I am very very lucky 😊

Extending opening hours is just one issue. It may not be the answer for you and for other businesses. Nobody is saying it is the answer to a booming business.

For a business to succeed you need to keep making changes and adapting to what people need otherwise people simply go elsewhere.

The new fruit and veg that opened near me offer free kids for apples

That sounds a bit too much going above and beyond, mind!

I think that's part of the problem though. I ask people what they want, get a lot of responses, adapt accordingly and still not a soul comes in for those later hours or that specific type of product everyone wanted to see. People seem to want you to adapt to their needs so that you're there for them at, say six o'clock, for that once every six months when they decide they need something. Not that I blame people really, it's not their fault. There's more convenient and cheaper options about than local and it's understandable in this climate that people go elsewhere.

Then if asking the people isn’t working, then adapt again and try a different method.

Look at the trends, what is popular, what is up and coming, can you offer something that no one else is offering. You know the market you are in.

You sound quite defeated.

It's a difficult one.. Costumers vote with their feet, good, attentive, personable service, good quality or unique products at reasonable prices will make people come back. Inconvenient opening times won't stop people. One can usually work around it, I don't think it's absurd, small businesses haven't got the money or staff to be open all the hours under the sun that people seem to be suggesting.. If it's just you on your own, you're quite entitled to have a lunch hour for example.. My reason for shopping at supermarkets is sadly just down to cost especially of late..!

Nobody is suggesting that small businesses open all hours under the sun but if they want to pack up at 3.45 then it’s no surprise that customers go elsewhere.

I know it's seriously frustrating when people say it would be great if you opened earlier or later, but they don't actually mean that they would come in regularly then and spend money with you. People who don't want to use your business have no right in interfering and telling you how you should run it.

However, like the shopkeeper upthread who clearly got so many people asking to buy batteries that they felt the need to put up a 'WE DO NOT SELL BATTERIES!" sign rather than do the obvious thing and start stocking batteries, I think it can also be easy for the business owner to assume they know what customers do/would want - and to declare that 'there's no call for it' when they have no real way of knowing.

Wouldn't it make sense to try out new hours/schemes for a limited time and then see how it goes - just how you would with new products that you don't know might or might not be popular? If people come and put their money where their mouths are, keep it going if you can; if they don't, lesson learned and bonus easy answer to know-it-all non-customers with their useless 'advice'.

20% of small businesses fold within the first year and 60% within 3 years.
Running a small business is hard because there are so many variables.
People on this thread are talking about small shops and opening hours. But there are other issues such as where your shop is located, who your main customers are, getting trustworthy staff, etc. You can't open long hours and staff a shop totally by yourself so you need to be able to have staff you can trust who will not rip you off. If your customers are mainly retired people, then there may be no point having longer opening hours as it may lead to only a tiny increase in customers.

I really miss a 24 hour shop that used to be open near me. But when recruiting low paid staff became difficult they kept posting notices they were shutting at 10om because of a lack of staff. Eventually they just changed the opening hours and now i9t closes at 10pm every night.

Not quite the same, but when I was a student I worked in retail and leading up to Xmas the shops were open until midnight. Sure a few people came in, but not many so they'd be better off opening until say 9 or 10pm, it's not like they would make more sales and it would cost having all the staff for that many extra hours. This was a long time ago, before online shopping as well. If say that's probably what happens with smaller businesses too, the extra hours mean less time with family and it's probably not worth the small amount of business?

Is it a front for a drug baron?

@wellstopdoingitthen you’d think it was. Actually I’ve often thought that about a fair number of little shops which keep hours that just don’t seem compatible with the needs of the customer - like the sweet shop upthread that doesn’t open for school children!
the wool shop in question is run by a much older lady, who probably thinks the calendar still says 1958….

Our local village - long shopping street- is a mix of fruit and veg/chemists/ordinary bakers/ charity shops/butcher/wool shop, haberdashery shop/ book shop and then on one stretch the trendy bakers and desert shops, deli, trendy cafes/'lifestyle' shops/florist.

I don't know how lots of them in the 'on-trend' stretch make a living. One cafe is always empty and so unwelcoming and expensive. One of the bakers opens at 10am and closes at 2pm and charges £3.50 for a muffin and £4.50 for a loaf of bread. The desert shop is so up itself it's funny- tiny, unwelcoming and extortionate £4.50 -£5.50 per slice of cake/torte (to take home because it's only big enough to have a counter for 2 people and the staff look as if you are a nuisance), opens 3 or 4 days a week at 10am and closes at 2pm. The wool shop seems as if it is never open. The 'lifestyle' shops sell one off things like art prints, room diffusers, attractive small tins etc that cost a fortune and I never see anyone buying- you feel uncomfortable going in because there's never anyone else in. None of the many cafes are anything much although they think they are. There's a 'cool' clothes shop for women and the prices are astonishing and it's always empty. There's one for men too and that's the same.
I've come to the conclusion the 'on-trend' ones must be run by people who run them as additional income and are not bothered about how much profit they make.

YANBU we’ve got a great butchers but shuts at 2pm.

Because the GP is not an emergency service. If you need a GP for something that cannot wait through the weekend, that counts as urgent / emergency and you need 111 or the emergency department. Surely, that’s not hard to understand?
PS. A lot of GP surgeries offer extended access on weekdays from 6.30 pm to 8.30pm and also Saturdays 9am to 1pm. But I remember a lot of patients did not attend those appointments because they forgot, had something better to do, or simply decided that rash could wait till the normal working hours on a weekday. .

Too many retail outlets only operate 9.00 to 5.00. So closing exactly at the point they would pick up most trade. I understand it’s a hard lifestyle but we no longer have woman indoors dealing with housekeeping and shopping during the day

Re GPS that’s different. Really work places should and if decent do allow time off for medical appointments. Also a big infrastructure of support around these services which don’t operate outside hours

Are you in US? Very very different to UK

I love our local greengrocers. But I work full time long hours and I’m only able to buy from them at weekends. Plus they are cash only which seems antiquated these days and I never have cash on me any more. Another greengrocer has opened up a few doors down in an old cafe and takes cards plus seems to be open really late. I wonder how the original shop is doing with this competition.