I am looking to create a small profitable pizza shop based on a small shop that has been in business for 40+ years. Below is a discription of this shop. What I think would be most important to change is italicized.
The pizza place I would like mine to resemble takes orders over the phone and uses a legal pad to keep track of the orders and they ring on a register and take cash or credit cards - no checks. All orders are taken when they are made, no computers here, you can see the pizza being made from the dough ball to ingredients added via a window, the pizza is placed in one of several large deck ovens to bake, it is removed to a box and sliced and handed to the customer or placed on top of the oven to keep it warm till the customer comes in to pick it up. There is a walk in, storage in the back, an employee restroom, and an area for cleaning and preparation. These areas are rather large. There is also a minimalist wait area with about 8 chairs.
The pizza are two sizes. No slices. The cheese is a good quality and huge. It is mounded on the pizza, not sprinkled like it was a pizza-pizza. Items are not reduced as you add more of them and they are huge as well. The pizza sauce is rather bland but it works rather well. NO ONE hates this pizza.
Pizza, spaghetti, and a few hot deli sandwiches are the only items they hand over the counter.
Canned drinks, 2 liter drinks, 1/2 gallon iced tea, and small salads are self serve from a small glass door cooler. A help yourself chip rack is also there if you have a notion for chips. I would say that 95% of sales are for pizzas. There is no suggestive selling or pushing of these items. This place exist to make and sell pizza.
This place has made so many pizzas that before the health dept made them get rid of the wooden pizza prep area the dough and paddles had worn the surface of the wood to the point that it was misshapen.
This is the type of pizza store I might want to open. Hopefully it would be cheap to open, cheap to run.
I think that they are tossing away 50% of their profit. What say you?
The following are things that I plan to search for and ask about in the forum. Can you please add further topics I should research and place your comments please?
Cost of start up and cost of doing business.
Store size and layout
Dry good storage off site? Is it cheaper than expensive shop space?
Oven type, those 90 second ovens vs deck ovens and how they affect quality.
Marketing
Target margin
Portable vs brick and mortar
Financing
Techniques of order taking, the legal tablet has it merits but lacks for suggestive selling, quick ordering, price verifying, advertising targeting, repeat customer encounter tracking, and stock control.
Employees, attracting long term quality people
Management
Valuing a pizza business for purchase and sale.
Suppliers, that Five Guys place has been based on a bedrock of quality suppliers, where to find quality and consistent dependable suppliers.
Maximizing impulse sales
Packaging beverages for maximum profit.
Creating a business plan.
Location, Location, Location
Profit, Profit, Profit
Menu (simple is what I am looking at)
Pizza style, taste (copy this place or not)
New profit items - knots and kookie bread
QUALITY CONTROL
QUALITY CONTROL when the boss is not there
Should I take on a family partner, what should I fear, what are the benefits?
Benefits of Take Home only.
Pizza for the freezer.
Again thank you for your assistance.