Just put an offer in on a corner shop!!

[FredBassett]

Very excited, we saw a small shop for sale with 3 bedroomed accommodation this week and it's lovely, loads of potential etc.. and I'll be able to work literally from home which is great as I get panic attacks!

Just put an offer in of £7,000 under asking price having spoken to the bank regarding finance and seeing the accounts so fingers crossed xxxxxx

good luck..whill you sell groceries then and papers and booze

The old couple who run it at the moment are retiring and don't sell papers or booze, it's very minimal so I really think that as a young family we'll be able to go in with a bit of energy and hopefully increase profits by offering more!

sounds promising..my tip for a shop is sell what people want and not want you like necessarily

oh good luck

Yay, the first offer was accepted!! Any advice greatly appreciated and thanks for the good lucks, I'm very excited!

fantastic..you can start planning!

I live in a small village and our local shop offers all sorts of extras like a send away dry cleaning service, cash point, logs & coal, home-made cakes (made by a local elderly lady), locally grown fruit & veg ie. sell what extras people have grown in their gardens etc. Lottery and a friendly attitude.

That's so exciting! Best of luck.

I hate to say this but papers, fags and booze are essential IMHO to bring in the customers.

And papers and fags have a very small profit margin and you have to be up very early to mark up the papers and get them delivered if you go that route.

sorry, I might be telling you stuff that you already know - do you have much experience of running a corner shop?

I agree Iota, that's where I can see the potential, we will probably go the newspaper route as although DH has a personal license to sell alcohol we would rather do early mornings than late nights especially having children. I have been a manager of a news/stationary shop and we both have Tesco experience - still a big challenge though!!

Well you know what your getting into then best wishes FB

there is someone on mn who has 4 corner shops i think..can't remember who but i know she has done well in a short time

and [bossy emoticon]sell brands rather than happy shopper

We have three shops now. My advice is to not go the newspaper delivery route. Unless you like getting up at 3am every day.

We have bought established businesses, wrecks of businesses and now we have just bought a completely empty unit for conversion.

Good luck, watch your margin and try to maintain a sense of humour.

Wow, you have a mini empire Cackle! Would you recommend wines and spirits instead?

Strawb, I think that's a great idea, it makes sense as they are our neighbours and customers.

I'm calling DH Norris already!

Who are you going to trade with? That decision will have a huge effect on what you can offer customers by way of loss leaders and special deals. I know all the main convenience suppliers and might be able to give you an idea of who is best wrt margin and offers.

You need booze, fags and papers (just don't ever, ever, ever deliver them) a decent chilled food range and the rest of the food basics. I can talk you through our pricing rational and where you can realisticly squeeze the margin.

To be honest, in your first year it really is a steep learning curve just to stop losing money in silly ways( staff/customer theft, wastage, forgetting to return mags and papers on time, overordering/overordering). Once you get your processes sorted you can concentrate on expanding your range and getting the best terms from suppliers.

We have been independant retailers and have also used a symbol group so I have a fair idea of all the angles. What's your squarefootage? Do you have lottery or a cashpoint?

I love talking shop.

from a customer point of view one of the local corner shops we use has been taken over by new people about two years ago and it is now excellent it is under the Thoroughgoods banner and they have transformed and doing very well..they even have air conditioning as well as state of the art epos suste,m

the other two shops in the row are rubbish by compariosn

Hi - thanks for your replies, that's what I need to hear, what you like to see in a corner shop!

Cackle, the shop we are buying is really tiny, not sure what sq footage but it really is just a 'corner' shop. The current owner gets the milk delivered but buys all other stock from Bookers. Looking at the accounts he seems to pay a lot for his stock and I would hope that I could find cheaper options although the amount of stock would probably be too small for a supplier. I don't know?!? Too much to think about!

I buy bread, (hides from mn food police Warburton's white sliced), milk,wine, lager,chocolate, crisps, occasionally nappies,weekend papers and local paper and very occasionally toilet rolls, shreddies, cornflakes, baked beans, birthdya cake candles

used toget cigarettes but dp has given up..hooray

They don't have fruit and veg or frozen food though and tbh fruit and veg in corner shops always looks tired

I live about 300 yards from the centre of town too so have the alternative of going to Tesco