The Space Was Vacated

Well, if you're keeping track, you're wondering to yourself when the heck I get the space. Funny you should ask! I was supposed to get the space on August 25th, but due since the tenant paid through the end of the month, they were able to stay there for the full month. Just to make sure, I passed by the mall tonight and saw that they had vacated the space. They didn't leave it in too bad a shape, but they did take a few things I didn't think they would be able to get away with.

The ice machine is no longer there and they took the sandwich prep station. The ice machine is attached to plumbing, so I figured it would be considered a leasehold improvement. I had already budgeted for a new ice machine and refrigerator. On the bright side, they left a glass door merchandiser that I may be able to use.

Submitted Plans to Health Department

This afternoon was very hectic. I took off early from work thanks to Mot's "Summer Hours" program and had to drive to Ft. Lauderdale to our architect's office to pick up six sets of plans. I had the architect sign and seal five of them and print out an extra set for me to keep. I then drove back up to Margate to drop off the plans at Florida's Division of Business and Professional Regulation. The Division of Hotels and Restaurants is the regulatory agency that reviews and issues permits for restaurants in Florida.

I managed to get to Hotel and Restaurants at 4:30 in the afternoon. This, along with the fact that I didn't have the required water and wastewater approval forms, didn't play well with the plan reviewer. She quickly told me that she didn't believe that I was there at 4:30 and that she couldn't work overtime anymore. Not having the water approval form or a water bill for the space almost cost me the chance to get the plans in for review before the end of the week. The reviewer ended up agreeing to let me fax the bill in on Monday but warned that if I didn't, it would be another 30 days in the review cycle. I'm hoping that I'll get their stamp in two weeks.

Free Gmail Invitation

I've got one Gmail invitation available that I will graciously give to the first person to post a comment on this post. If you include details of why you read, I'll even send you your first message on your new account :)

Back From Vacation

My wife and I just got back from a quick cruise vacation with the two kids. This was sort of the last break before things get crazy through construction and then opening the business in November. We took a three-night cruise to the Bahamas and Castaway Key on Disney's Wonder. Overall it was a good trip even with a two-year-old and five-month-old. My only complaint was the quality of the food aboard the ship. I've had much better meals aboard Carnival cruises and I figured Disney should at least been as good.

Final Store Design

The design phase of the first Florida Chippery unit is done and boy has it been a chore (more to come later). Little changed from the initial concept that I posted about earlier, but I thought I should post the final layout for prosperity's sake.



The main difference between this one and the one I posted earlier is that the counter has a raised section at the end and a couple of cubby holes along the front face for displaying bagged chips. The face of the raised portion of the counter will be finished in Chemetal #449 Ripple with a Real Red tint. The effect I'm looking for looks very much like fire running up the side of the counter if the lighting is right.

(Re)writing the Business Plan

As I told you folks earlier, I lost my previous business plan due to a combination of stupidity and laziness. The plan wasn't finished (as if they ever are) so I had never printed a copy or sent it to anybody for review before losing the USB key drive that I stored it on. Well, I'm in the process of re-writing the business plan for the Chippery and I'm much happier with this version than the last. I've been able to take a step back and re-think the entire concept. I'm no longer married to the words that I had thrown on the page just so that I didn't have to stare at a blank sheet anymore.

In doing the re-write, I've gone back to one of the resources I've always used to get my bearings on the outline. That's Inc.com. They have a series of posts (Build a Strong Business Plan, Section by Section) that for some reason or other, I've always used to get a better idea of what I should include in the business plan. The articles may not be all-encompassing, but they've helped me. I thought I should share.

Employment Pre-Screening Service

Wow! What a racket! Here's an itch looking for a scratch...

I've been looking for a service that will automate the employment pre-screening for my chippery stores. I figure that for high-turnover businesses like this there must be something where I can pay a monthly fee to have any candidate answer a few preliminary questions, then if they satisfy our criteria, have them move on to a short personality assessment. Personality assessments are available in the public domain and the rest of it isn't rocket science.

Well, I've found a few providers, but none that are even remotely close to what I'm willing to pay. One wouldn't even quote because they target operations with more than 4000 units. The ones I have gotten prices from charge upwards of $2500 for initial setup and then about $25-$50 per candidate - not qualified candidate, just candidate. If I send 10 people to this site, they charge me $250-$500 that month! The incremental cost for each new applicant is zero once the system is set up!

I don't know about you, but this looks like a rip off.