Coffee Shops Problems (Part 1)
Running an independent coffee shop in Jakarta, is a challenging business indeed. You're competing with huge coffee shop chain (read : Starbucks) or with instant sachet coffees, while the rent is sky rocketing high. So how to survive? In this post I would like to discuss the common problems that most coffee shops in Jakarta are facing, some of these problems are genuinely preventable by the owners when they create / build the coffee shop. So if you're thinking to boost up your coffee shop sales, or thinking to open a coffee shop in the future, these are the the common problems or mistakes that you need to acknowledge (so you can avoid or prevent it) to survive. Here we go!
1. Lack of Identity / Concept
Okay let's face it, creating business plan seems manageable for some reasons, but creating the identity of the coffee shop, the concept, let alone the overall branding, it's not as easy as writing your business plan. Between 2017 to 2018 there's a lot of new coffee shop open up in Jakarta, it's booming. Everyone want to open a coffee shops, following the trend. But most of them seems to open in a rush, without a strong identity and concept in mind. The owner needs to think about this throughly, because the identity of your coffee shop determines your target market. What kind of customers that you would like to attract? Does your concept sustainable?
2. Wrong Type of Menu
As the owner of the coffee shop, I'm a 100% sure that most of you would like to serve drinks or food that suits your preferences. But you also need to understand your market. If your customers mostly are young hipster coffee geeks, I would recommend serving single origin coffee with V60 or Chemex or Aeropress, instead of ice blended frappe drinks. If your customers mostly busy office people, create a Grab and Go kind of menu that's fast to prepare, since they don't have a lot of time to sit and wait. I believe this is an easy thing to do, you as the coffee shop owner just need to understand the customer preferences, you can change the menu every now and then to adapt. What kind of menu that your customers want? Does your coffee shop have enough selections? Or too many that's confusing?
3. Location, location, location
Different than most capital cities, Jakarta is widely known for the unbelievable traffic jam, since there's insufficient public transport to support the people, locations really matters if you're going to open a coffee shop. Because people will not show up if it's too far to reach, or too much traffic to deal with to get there. You would like to open where the crowds are. And usually it's the malls. Since there's no park whatsoever here in Jakarta, most Jakartans just hopping from malls to malls. Opening coffee shop in malls are good, but the rent charge is crazy high. So as alternative, pick a location that's near the malls, or office areas, or residential areas. An area that's still convenient for your customers to reach. You also need to pay attention on the demographic. Is it a one way street? Is it hard to get a parking spot? Is it an upscale area? Does the location support your coffee shop identity or branding?
4. Good Quality Products
While most people here in Jakarta very much into gimmicky products, publish anything new and go viral can really boost your sales for couple of weeks, it's not sustainable. In the end of the day you really need to have a good quality products to stay in the game. To make sure your customers keep on coming back and spend in your cafe, you need to sell something that's not only look good for photos (thanks to social media) but also taste good. If you serve coffee with beautiful latte art, good! But what about the taste? Does your coffee taste stale? Does your coffee taste burned?
5. Wrong type of Espresso Machine
To have a good cup of coffee it goes all the way back to the quality of the coffee beans, roasting process, barista skills, etc. But one thing for sure, if you would like to open a coffee shop and boost the sales, you need a dependable espresso machine. Especially during peak hours. Your customers wont be happy if they need to wait 15 minutes for their coffee. The best time to deliver coffee to your customer is under 10 minutes. More than that, the customers will start asking for their coffee. So to achieve that time limit, you need a dependable & fast espresso machine in your coffee shop. An espresso machine that have stability on the pressure & temperatures no matter how busy your coffee shops are.
There is a lot more to discuss on this topic, so take your time, do some evaluations and research before we continue to the Part 2.
xoxo
AP
1. Lack of Identity / Concept
Okay let's face it, creating business plan seems manageable for some reasons, but creating the identity of the coffee shop, the concept, let alone the overall branding, it's not as easy as writing your business plan. Between 2017 to 2018 there's a lot of new coffee shop open up in Jakarta, it's booming. Everyone want to open a coffee shops, following the trend. But most of them seems to open in a rush, without a strong identity and concept in mind. The owner needs to think about this throughly, because the identity of your coffee shop determines your target market. What kind of customers that you would like to attract? Does your concept sustainable?
2. Wrong Type of Menu
As the owner of the coffee shop, I'm a 100% sure that most of you would like to serve drinks or food that suits your preferences. But you also need to understand your market. If your customers mostly are young hipster coffee geeks, I would recommend serving single origin coffee with V60 or Chemex or Aeropress, instead of ice blended frappe drinks. If your customers mostly busy office people, create a Grab and Go kind of menu that's fast to prepare, since they don't have a lot of time to sit and wait. I believe this is an easy thing to do, you as the coffee shop owner just need to understand the customer preferences, you can change the menu every now and then to adapt. What kind of menu that your customers want? Does your coffee shop have enough selections? Or too many that's confusing?
3. Location, location, location
Different than most capital cities, Jakarta is widely known for the unbelievable traffic jam, since there's insufficient public transport to support the people, locations really matters if you're going to open a coffee shop. Because people will not show up if it's too far to reach, or too much traffic to deal with to get there. You would like to open where the crowds are. And usually it's the malls. Since there's no park whatsoever here in Jakarta, most Jakartans just hopping from malls to malls. Opening coffee shop in malls are good, but the rent charge is crazy high. So as alternative, pick a location that's near the malls, or office areas, or residential areas. An area that's still convenient for your customers to reach. You also need to pay attention on the demographic. Is it a one way street? Is it hard to get a parking spot? Is it an upscale area? Does the location support your coffee shop identity or branding?
4. Good Quality Products
While most people here in Jakarta very much into gimmicky products, publish anything new and go viral can really boost your sales for couple of weeks, it's not sustainable. In the end of the day you really need to have a good quality products to stay in the game. To make sure your customers keep on coming back and spend in your cafe, you need to sell something that's not only look good for photos (thanks to social media) but also taste good. If you serve coffee with beautiful latte art, good! But what about the taste? Does your coffee taste stale? Does your coffee taste burned?
5. Wrong type of Espresso Machine
To have a good cup of coffee it goes all the way back to the quality of the coffee beans, roasting process, barista skills, etc. But one thing for sure, if you would like to open a coffee shop and boost the sales, you need a dependable espresso machine. Especially during peak hours. Your customers wont be happy if they need to wait 15 minutes for their coffee. The best time to deliver coffee to your customer is under 10 minutes. More than that, the customers will start asking for their coffee. So to achieve that time limit, you need a dependable & fast espresso machine in your coffee shop. An espresso machine that have stability on the pressure & temperatures no matter how busy your coffee shops are.
There is a lot more to discuss on this topic, so take your time, do some evaluations and research before we continue to the Part 2.
xoxo
AP
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