At Zeitlin’s everything is riding on us getting in a storefront ASAP.
We’ve grown to 5 full time cooks and a crew of 5 people running our booths at the farmers markets. We are bursting our shared kitchen to the seams and we need a new home.
Honest - if it was up to us, we’d be in a new location tomorrow.Â
But there are 5 key things that affect when and where we can move.
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1) Cost and time of build out
Unless a location was recently a food business with a large built out kitchen (not a Dunkin Donuts, not a laundromat) the cost and timeline of building out a location can run beyond $300,000-$400,000 and take a whole year.
For locations that require a new HVAC, plumbing or grill hood – this can instantly blow up a budget. If you’ve seen season 2 of The Bear, you know what we’re talking about.
The ideal and likely option for us will be a second generation location that we can move in and open up as quick as possible for approximately $125,000-$150,000 of total installation costs. This does not include many other expenses for a new storefront.
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2) Cost of rent
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We've looked at lots of different spots with different price tags. Some places charge a lot because they're in popular areas, while others are cheaper but don't get as many people walking by.
We're still a growing business, so we have to be careful. We need to pick a place where we can afford the rent without getting into financial trouble.
They say rent should be about 8% of your revenue, and that’s the rule we're trying to follow as we look for our new location.
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3) Rental terms and contract
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We've learned a lot about what goes into renting a place for our business. It's really about how much risk we're willing to take and what costs we're okay with handling. But don't worry, we've got help!
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We're working with a broker who we really trust. He's giving us good advice on what to look for in a rental contract. Big thanks to Marcus!
His advice: we’ve got to love the location, and we’ve got to love the deal!
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4) Location and communityÂ
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A lot of people voted for us to open our store in Hyde Park, and we hear you! We know that many of you are worried we might choose another neighborhood, despite clearly being the leader in our polling. We want to be where we can make the most people happy and fill a gap in the community.
People in Hyde Park are really excited about the idea of us opening a store there, and we're excited too! But just so you know, there aren't many places available that already have a kitchen set up for us to use.
The good news is that we are in conversations with locations becoming available there, but in the end is not entirely up to us. Want to help us out? If you want to give us leverage in these conversations, please leave us a kind Google Review and mention where you’d like us to be. We will take screenshots and send these to landlords. You can also email us at bagels@zeitlinsdeli.com where our entire team sees these emails.
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5) The landlord accepting us
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The reality is that some landlords see us as an early business and they would rather put a tenant that has more cash on hand. We’ve been turned down before due to this.
That’s why we are doing our Wefunder campaign to raise $300,000, to have the necessary funds to be taking into consideration and quickly and smoothly build out a storefront.Â
Closing words🙏:
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Choosing the best spot for our restaurant isn't easy, but it's super important. We've thought about a lot of things and we believe we're on the right path to find an awesome place for our first store.
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Like we said earlier, we wish we could have moved already, but we want to make sure we're doing what's best for you, our customers, and our business. We've grown a lot, but we still need your support to get into a real, permanent store—the kind of store that our food, our community, and the city of Chicago deserve.
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If you need to wait for us to have signed a storefront to buy a bagel bond, we understand. Though if you are ready to support, please buy a bagel bond here!
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