You guys thought I was crazy

[Kyle]

Hey all,

I finally registered! Yay for Kyle! Anyhow. I got the new store up and running. We called it:

Wiseguys Pizza
A “Family” Buisness

It has been very hard! We broke over $2000 for a week just once so far out of 5 weeks. Most days we do not get to $200. I lowered my prices from my old Toarminas pizza shop dramatically. But there have been two other shops open up in the same time and they had money to market and I don’t. Funny thing is that one of the guys is going the low price route that most folks here were lambasting me for. He does an everyday special, no coupon needed, check this out!

16" 2 topping pizza and a 2 liter of pop for $7.99 (add breadsticks for $1.99)

He also does an 18" one topping pizza for $10.00 and of course the obligatory $5.00 large one topping pick up only pizza.

I’ll keep you guys posted but this very well may be my last month of this long nightmare. I can get a substitute teaching job starting in September. It only pays $350 a week but that is a lot more than I have been making for the last year and a half. I will try to upload my menu here to see if you guys noitice anything really wrong with it. Thanks!

Kyle

 

[td_VP192]

Kyle:

…check this out!

16" 2 topping pizza and a 2 liter of pop for $7.99 (add breadsticks for $1.99)

He also does an 18" one topping pizza for $10.00 and of course the obligatory $5.00 large one topping pick up only pizza.

^Isn’t this one of the signs of the end of the world as it’s written in the Bible ? Well… even if it is the end of the world, I think we’ll still stay open to capture the business of the ‘other’ pizza places that will be closed. Seeking shelter and trying to survive Armagedon.

 

[Kyle]

I just wish I was in a part of the country where quality counted for something. I sure as hell wish I could sell a large pizza for $11 or $12!

 

[goomba]

Hey kyle,where are you located? You can sell a lrg. pie for 11-12.00 as long as it is tasty enough and what else are you offering at your place besides pizza? And how much if any are you marketing?Give us some details.
Niccademo

 

[pizzabarntn]

keep your head up i fought the urge to do low price pizzas my compitetion has gone that route they got some of my business for a few weeks but thats it my cust. relize you get what you pay for they were doing 16 pie one topping for 6.99 and it was cheaper than hunt bros pizza around here. i charge 12.75 for 1 topping 16 pie and i started running some specials with pizza wings and breadsticks that have worked good for us in my neck of the woods if i can keep my specials between 20.00 - 25.00 and feed a family of 4 - 5 it works good . do you do wings, sandwiches, these are both big sellers and both easy!!! as are calzones hope you can hang in there and if you cant out price them out service them my competition is just about done after going at them for six solid months there parking lot is always empty except on sunday after church.just keep at it grind grind grind (and like my dad says ) YOU NEVER FAIL TILL YOU QUIT!!!

 

[NicksPizza]

goomba:

Hey kyle,where are you located? You can sell a lrg. pie for 11-12.00 as long as it is tasty enough and what else are you offering at your place besides pizza? And how much if any are you marketing?Give us some details.
Niccademo

ALERT . . . . can of worms opening . . . ALERT

There was a fun and somewhat challenging thread on his location and evolution to dirt cheap pizza. That thread contributed to the decision to assign additional moderators to delete posts and threads.

http://www.pmq.com/tt/viewtopic.php?t=3142&start=0

 

[Kyle]

Hey guys,
I was not trying to open a can of worms, I just wanted to update those that had made suggestions previously. There was just one real jerkwad that was giving me crap. Hey any thoughts on how I can upload my menu here? It is in MS Publisher format. Thanks!

Kyle

 

[snowman]

You say that this may very well be your last month of this business. You admit that we thought you were crazy and you haven’t been over $2000 but once. You’ve lowered your prices and decided to play low-price war. You’re losing as best I can see it. You have no money for advertising, so you’re extremely undercapitalized. In the end, it sounds like you just didn’t have the capitalization to start the business and can’t hang on long enough to start making money – and no means to advertise that you want business.

It really sounds like the life support system has pretty much run out. Is there something I’m missing here?

 

[Kyle]

Snowman, my point was that you guys said I was nuts to go the low price route, but 2 other places opened and they ALSO went the low price route. I am the ONLY, YES I SAID ONLY pizza place that advertises great pizza. No one else says that their pizza is good anywhere in their ads. They only advertiae that it is CHEAP! I get flyers or menus from about 7 or 8 places a week just at my house alone. EVERY ONE OF THEM touts their low prices. I am undercapitalized. I bought a shop that was represented as making a $60,000 a year profit. It never made that in ten years combined! I have 4 employees of the former owner ready and willing to sign an affidavit that shows the former owners were always complaining about being broke and that the employees made more money than they did. I was defrauded and financially devastated!

That being said I still can advertise that at the 2007 Pizza Pizzaz Competition I was judged to be one of the Top 15 pizza makers in America! I also can tell everyone that no one else from Michigan was in the Top 50! In the end people just seem to want to know what my specials are and if they can feed their family for $10. I wish I was like all the people around here that just go back to Iraq or Lebanon to get more money and come back and flood the market with flyers for Cheap Pizza!

 

[wa_dave]

Kyle

Sad story about being ripped off.

For mine I would put my energies in getting my money back rather than spend the hours you are doing for a lousy $2,000 turnover.

To put it bluntly and without any sarcasm, malice or anything else - GET OUT OF THERE.

You couldn’t make it with reasonable priced pizzas and you won’t make it with cheap ones doing only $2k per week.

Sometimes it’s cruel to be kind. Mate, there is no way being undercapitalised, up against cashed competitors, in a high unemployment low cash area with multiple competitor sites, and wanting to go the cheap sell way that you are ever going to make money.

Go back to teaching knowing that you gave it a shot at something you wanted to do. You did it, but you didn’t make money. Sounds like you are young enough to get back into the workforce and start all over again.

Make the break NOW. Put your life back on track and get an income coming in. You will soon get over the “pizza bug”.

Best of luck

Dave

 

[Kyle]

Hey Dave,

Actually I was in the mortgage and real estate business for 10 years before I got the store. The substitute teaching is only possible because over the last year I went back to school and got my Bachelors Degree. I was not a teacher in the past. However, the mortgage and real estate business in Michigan is in the toilet (along with most business in the state) so that is not even a possibility any more. I turned 41 this past month. Not really young enough to start a new career and there are not really any jobs up here anyhow. But I have a child with my ex wife so I can’t leave the state and seek a job in one of the booming areas either!

 

[wa_dave]

Kyle:

Hey Dave,

Actually I was in the mortgage and real estate business for 10 years before I got the store. The substitute teaching is only possible because over the last year I went back to school and got my Bachelors Degree. I was not a teacher in the past. However, the mortgage and real estate business in Michigan is in the toilet (along with most business in the state) so that is not even a possibility any more. I turned 41 this past month. Not really young enough to start a new career and there are not really any jobs up here anyhow. But I have a child with my ex wife so I can’t leave the state and seek a job in one of the booming areas either!

When the brown stuff hits the fan it gets flung far and wide, eh?

Man you are young yet !!!

I got made redundant at 51 by a US multinational without an adequate redundancy package. At my age and with my experience I was told - too old, too experienced.

I then started a sales agengcy but payment flow was too slow and then this pizza shop right across the road from where I live came on the market and the rest is history. So you are never too old to take on something new.

Hearing what is going on in the US with mortgage closures etc it is hard to get back into that. Great to see you did that extra and got your degree - power to you for doing it at your age in life (still a lot younger than me

I would still get out of the shop and do something with an income.

Being stubborn and staying hoping to make it will only drive you down in a heap. “Pride commeth before the fall”.

Dave

 

[Kyle]

I have a real problem with accepting defeat. I see these guys that can barely speak English making a killing and selling crap pizza and I am a True Blue American, I sell a really great pizza at a very reasonable price and I can’t get a dang break to save my life. IT’S NOT FAIR!!! (jumps up and down stomping on the floor)

Now here is the last option. I had one of my custos tell me his kids would drop flyers for me. I did a million dollar letter and made an expiration date of Saturday 8/4. They are dropping 700 tomorrow. We’ll see what happens!

 

[wa_dave]

Kyle:

I have a real problem with accepting defeat. I see these guys that can barely speak English making a killing and selling crap pizza and I am a True Blue American, I sell a really great pizza at a very reasonable price and I can’t get a dang break to save my life. IT’S NOT FAIR!!! (jumps up and down stomping on the floor)

Now here is the last option. I had one of my custos tell me his kids would drop flyers for me. I did a million dollar letter and made an expiration date of Saturday 8/4. They are dropping 700 tomorrow. We’ll see what happens!

Where you are born has nothing to do with it. It’s the cash to keep going - advertising, buying, hanging in time, staffing etc.

I understand how you feel, I’ve had my times when I’ve thrown myself on the floor and rolled around screaming at life’s crap it throws at you.

There are a lot of dead heros in the cemetry who couldn’t accept defeat and kept battling against the odds. There’s nothing to fear from walking away from a losing battle if you know you gave it your best shot.

From all your previous posts you leave us with the impression there is little money around, no-one wants to pay a fair price for a fair product, the market is satuarated, outlets are going broke around you and you are up to your neck in debt, BUT you love what you are doing and you want to succeed.

The reality is in your situation and where you are you won’t succeed.

Sometimes you have to swallow your pride and move on. Life goes on and I bet you your bottom dollar a week after you have gone no-one will give 2 flips about you or remember who you were.

STOP PUNISHING YOURSELF.

Dave

 

[NicksPizza]

Kyle:

I have a real problem with accepting defeat. I see these guys that can barely speak English making a killing and selling crap pizza and I am a True Blue American, I sell a really great pizza at a very reasonable price and I can’t get a dang break to save my life. IT’S NOT FAIR!!! (jumps up and down stomping on the floor)

Now here is the last option. I had one of my custos tell me his kids would drop flyers for me. I did a million dollar letter and made an expiration date of Saturday 8/4. They are dropping 700 tomorrow. We’ll see what happens!

I venture to say that it is impossible to succeed in the market you described for us. It is probably insane to try to operate a relatively new pizza place in that economic marketplace where there are already something like SIXTY in operation, and the economic atmosphere is crumbling around you. Do what you will to hang onto the business, but it is time to walk away.

Learn the lessons you can from this venture, and move to your next life experience. One day you can look back at the operations decisions, business planning decisions, marketing decisions and personnel decisions you made to see what you did well and what was flawed. One day. Who knows, you may find a better situation somewhere else better to try the pizza world again . . . or maybe you can recover from the illness and have a ‘normal’ life that we all dream of.

 

[famouspizza]

I have a real problem with accepting defeat. I see these guys that can barely speak English making a killing and selling crap pizza and I am a True Blue American, I sell a really great pizza at a very reasonable price and I can’t get a dang break to save my life. IT’S NOT FAIR!!! (jumps up and down stomping on the floor)

Wow…it’s amazing people still think like this. Your nationality has nothing to do with it…in most instances these guys you are competing against are more hungry and willing to work for much less in order to survive. From what you have told us you seem to think you are more educated, so use your knowledge to either play the game or walk away.

 

[Kyle]

Work for less than me? Not possible. I have worked for over 18 months now and not made a penny! I live off my Earned income credit and money I can make playing cards. These other guys drive Hummers and Mercedes. I work for free they get paid well!

And don’t kid yourself, around here nationality means something. For instance I bet a lot of you drive foreign cars. Not around here! Detroit area is very touchy about this.

 

[Wizzle_Wassell]

Kyle:

These other guys drive Hummers and Mercedes. I work for free they get paid well!

And don’t kid yourself, around here nationality means something. For instance I bet a lot of you drive foreign cars. Not around here! Detroit area is very touchy about this.

Yep, that good old USA make of cars…Mercedes. Kyle your arguments really don’t stack up much!

 

[Kyle]

Wizzle Wassell:

Kyle:

These other guys drive Hummers and Mercedes. I work for free they get paid well!

And don’t kid yourself, around here nationality means something. For instance I bet a lot of you drive foreign cars. Not around here! Detroit area is very touchy about this.

Yep, that good old USA make of cars…Mercedes. Kyle your arguments really don’t stack up much!

???

I simply stated that these guys make cheap crap pie and make plenty of $. I also said that my area is sensitive to foreign anything. I for one won’t hire a driver with a foreign car. Most of my custos either work for or retired from an American Car company. A ton of Ford workers around here.

 

[Wizzle_Wassell]

Kyle:

???

I simply stated that these guys make cheap crap pie and make plenty of $. I also said that my area is sensitive to foreign anything. I for one won’t hire a driver with a foreign car. Most of my custos either work for or retired from an American Car company. A ton of Ford workers around here.

You stated that most of these guys who make cheap crap pies drive Hummers and Mercedes (I’ll make it realy easy for you Mercedes is a German car!), then in the next sentence tell us that people in your area don’t drive foreign cars.

as you say ‘???’