main shopping street property available-what business could i open?

[cremolafoam]

The property in question belongs to my Dad who cannot sell it and has been unable to let it.He has offered it to me if I think I can make it into some kind of enterprise that will pay the rent and rates( quite low)
it is a second&third floor large 2 storey showroom /office on a main street in an upmarket town- beside a library,above a chic women's clothes shop and near to 2 fancy shmancy coffee places.Other shops nearby inlcude a posh kids clothes shop,a good Oxfam,2 pricy restaurants,2 upmarket hairdressers,several banks,a Tesco metro a smart interiors emporium ( cath Kidston Crabtree and evelyn /Emma Bridgewater/Greengate stylee)and a busy post office.The local area is a mixture of top of the market houses excellent primary and grammar schools and it is also a garrison town.

I have run two businesses before but neither of these models suit the property.
any ideas of what you would do woud be welcome, bearing in mind that there is a recession on.

you could sell bunting and cupcakes [smartarse emoticon]

nooooooooooooo too many of those already.
it is the kind of town where those places actually do good business tho'.lots of ladies who lunch.

set up a clinic type place where alternative type could come and acupuncture/aromatherapise/burn sage etc. i image minimal cost and risk.

How about a clothing exchange for women's and children's clothes - No outgoings and good returns in a recession?

(Is it called an exchange - where people bring in their good quality used kit and you pay them for it once you have sold it, taking a decent cut.) It's the perfect credit crunch business.

I can only think that a service (like acupuncture/alternative therapies) would cause someone to go up stairs when there was no linking business downstairs.

And you would need a sandwich board outside.

Hmm, difficult to get folks up a stairs tbh. they will go up if they really need to so a vital service would be good but they won't naturally want to iyswim. So what is the gap in the market in that town?

oh that sounds quite a good idea actually swedes- and there isn't one there ATM.Theres is one near where i live- about 10 miles away so i must go and have a reccy.
My mum is fantastic on the sewing machine too and could do alterations.( she would love in on the act)

thanks

Could you also do clothes making classes (with your mum on the sewing machine), knitting, sewing, etc etc.

what about a very selective and cool knitting and haberdashers?

there is one in our city up stairs - they focus on wedding fabrics and fancy dress stuff (fabrics and bits), plus nice stuff for customising, a few furnishing fabrics and materials for making curtains inc blackout fabric, and basic equipment (thread needles, notions); apparently sewing machines are selling better, you could sell a couple maybe; offer contact details for dressmakers, alterations and sewing machine repair; plus knitting yarn (extremely cool only).

I've no idea what the economics of this sort of thing are - bad probably - but it seems to fit the ambience?

ah, maybe there is a combination of ideas here

books, stationery? you could host book clubs, rhyme time for mothres and babies?

good thinking evrybody
keep it coming

A secretarial/accounts service for small businesses.

When I was in Amsterdam, they had a childrens only hairdresser. The chairs were like aeroplanes etc for the children to sit in and moved up and down. But then you would need to find willing hairdressers.

here

Ooh, how exciting!!! The clothes exchange with alterations and customising sounds fab. Also along those lines, you could make cushions/bags/purses/scarves etc out of peoples clothes if they are not quite suitable - in a very chic way of course. Good luck!

Crafts for kids, posh (cheaper than others around) coffee, cakes and mumsnet access for mums. . Stairs, I'd climb a mountain for that.

Pottery cafe?

Some sort of cafe aimed at families (although stairs may prove a problem).

a Wiccan Shop. This is my favourite one, but sadly I now live 200miles away from it wiccamoon.org.uk/

I'm liking the idea of a pamper salon, doing eyebrows, nails, massages and selling beauty products for these purposes. In such an area I would also consider pamper taster sessions for children, then I could also sell cute hair clips. I would also look into the possiblity of a juice bar if there was room for it there.

Some type of thing where you could do childrens parties at the weekend, like the pampering etc.

This type of thing