I’m completely out of my element here and I’m hoping you might be able to guide us if not provide advice directly.
My husband and I bought a small pizzaria about 90 days ago. I have a full-time job and he is active duty military slated to retire in April. We work at the store 7 days a week but can’t be there from 11am opening until 5. We have gone through several mangers and “shift supervisors” and have had about every problem possible - from work not being done, bad product leaving the store, bad customer service, theft and more.
We were recovering and have changed some of our expectatation and have a new challenge. We received an application from a manager of a competitor’s store and after interviewing, decided to hire her and her partner, who also worked at the competitor. They wanted to give notice at the present store and after doing so, they were told to leave immediately. The came by and let us know they could start with us the next day. While they were there - after completing paperwork, uniforms etc. the owner of the competitor showed up at our store and pulled them out, proceeding to talk to them at our doorstep for about 45 minutes. One girl periodically came back inside to let us know what was going on. The other owner was bad-mouthing us, our store, the reputation and so on. End result, they all hopped in the car and left. I guess we lost them.
This after finding out from these potential employees that he’s paying people under the table for as little as $3.50, taking orders off the books, stealing other people’s marketing materials and menus and generally being very unpleasant. Because of our attempt at hiring (which we did not go after his employees - they came to us), we now are in a tough position. So now, we unintentionally have an enemy in the competition instead of your standard friendly competition. We’re not experienced at underhanded techniques or nasty competion. How can we handle this?
Our store has a horrible reputation from the former owners that we have been working on…the last thing we need is to be targeted by someone like this. We are so frustrated we’re thinking about taking the loss and quitting. We are in an excellent market and historical sales show the store is capable of $15K-$20K weekly and we’re currently at about $4K. Any advice?
If you want some ideas on how to compete with this store on their own underhanded level, repost your question directed to “naked bulldog”. He doesn’t post too often anymore, but if you search the archives you will see this is definatly his area of expertise.
This after finding out from these potential employees that he’s paying people under the table for as little as $3.50
anonymous call to the labor dept.
taking orders off the books
anonymous call to the IRS
stealing other people’s marketing materials and menus and generally being very unpleasant
-everytime you put out flyers and see his, take 'em. Look at his specials, see if you can match them. Undercut him by $1 on EVERY coupon he’s got. OR, send out your own coupon saying something like this:
We now accept “Weinerhead Pizzas” coupons, use his coupon and we’ll give you a free small pizza to go with it.
Who cares if you’re being targeted by someone. Target them back. As a matter of fact, put the crosshairs directly onto his business and make it your mission to go after him and make his life miserable. It’s actually kind of fun and gives you new things to do every week. It eases the monotony of going in, making pizzas, doing paperwork, going home. Besides, I’ll be damned if I have some asshole talk down about me and my business. You do that and you’ve just entered yourself into a fight you won’t win.
Now, of course, like I said… I like confrontation. You might not want to do that and I completely understand. But those phone calls on items 1 and 2 won’t hurt. Hope this helps. -J_r0kk
You stated the previous owners had a bad reputation in your community, so the first thing that needs to be done is to turn that around. I would have a customer appreciation day (party). Have a fun filled day with great prices, free prizes, and the best customer service you can provide. Make sure you get all contact info from everyone attending so you can market to them directly with specials, etc. Put together a marketing plan that is organized and consistent.
If you worry too much about what that compeitior is doing you won’t focus on your store. Start setting up cross-promotions with businesses around the competitor. Stay marketing agressive, but do fall to his tactics. Hope this helps. Good luck.
You stated the previous owners had a bad reputation in your community, so the first thing that needs to be done is to turn that around.
Also, the guest made another good point. Have you changed the name, image, colors, logo of your new pizza place? If not, customer perception is that your place is the same old pizza place. And once you’ve got a bad reputation it’s so hard to shake it. Change it up and let the customer know it’s not the same ol’ same ol’.