Image details: Coffee Shop served by picapp.com

As I’ve written before on this blog, I love coffee.  And I have a wonderful vision of sitting in a tiny coffee shop, serving biscotti, bagels and all kinds of coffee and tea.  People are chatting, using their laptops, resting.  And I’m having a great time chatting, making fantastic-smelling and looking latte’s, and raking in the money.

OK, it’s a dream.  Have you ever thought about running a coffee shop?  It’s a growing business, despite Starbuck’s recent downturn and its announcement that it is closing 600 stores.  In a current article, Business Week stated there are over 26,000 coffee shops (including kiosks and carts) in the U.S., and 60% are independent. 

The trade association for coffee, the Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA), says that coffee shops/kiosks/drive-ups are a $12 billion industry in the U.S. While Starbucks might be closing stores, independent coffee shops are finding their niches and thriving.

What makes a coffee shop successful? An SCAA poll showed these characteristics to be most important:

• Coffee quality and convenient location (70% of adults cited this factor)

• Friendly and knowledgeable staff (40%)
• Variety (35%)
• Price (26%)

A story on ABC News in Chicago a year ago said people consider coffee like “fine wine.” I think this is going a tiny too far. And most people don’t drink that much wine each day. On the other hand, there are several people who consider coffee a necessity, not a luxury.

Do you think the speciality coffee business is (pardon the pun) running out of steam? Or will it survive the economic downturn and come back again stronger? Would you take into account opening a coffee shop?

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Just a reminder about the contest I’m running - submit a suggestion for a book each baby boomer business owner should have. Win a opportunity to receive the two top business books (in my opinion). Use the link in my July 24 blog post for more information and to comment.

Tags: baby boomers, business books, Michael Gerber, starting a business, Warren Buffett

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Found this short presentation on Slideshare, and I thought it’d be an interesting topic to discuss. Do you make an effort in establishing your own personal brand - whether in your industry at huge or within your own company? What steps have you taken?

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PimpYourWork

“Promises are meant to be broken.” - Ancient Hindu Proverb (well, not really)

We all make promises at work

We make promises to our supervisors, colleagues, or clients.

We don’t necessarily keep them, but we make them anyway.

When we break promises we look like jerks (or incompetent, or both).  When we keep them, people expect it and they just think you’re doing your job.

How do you keep promises and still get that wow factor?

1. Under-promise.
2. Over-deliver.
3. Quantify everything. 

To under-promise is to make a public commitment to do something, but this something is actually much less than what you’ve planned.

• If you think you can finish a job in 2 days, tell your boss you can finish it in 4.
• If you’re planning to raise monthly sales by 40%, tell everyone you’ll try to raise it by 10%.

Of course, when you eventually deliver the promise, you would’ve either met their expectations or exceeded them - since you set their expectations lower than what you could achieve.  In either case, you get a positive reaction.

Which is infinitely superior than the embarrassment you’ll face if you don’t deliver what you promised.

Most business people make the mistake of promising massive, and the delivery rarely lives up to the promise.  If it does, you’re lucky - but this is rare.

Another important thing to remember is to quantify.  From the steps you need to take to fulfill your promise, to listing the measurable, concrete data that’ll qualify whether you’ve fulfilled your promise or not.Why is this important?

•  You can actually measure whether you’ve accomplished what you set out to do, or whether you fell short of it or exceeded it.
• There will be a specific definition of what your goals are.  Instead of saying an abstract sentence like “I’ll work harder.” state “I’ll always arrive early and turn in my reports the day before the deadline.”A vague and subjective promise such as “work harder” means different things to different people.  Quantifying avoids miscommunication.

How good are you at keeping your promises?  I currently rate myself 6.5 out of 10.  How would you evaluate yourself?  What was the last professional promise you made?  How did you fare in keeping it?
Image by Tomas Inny  from sxc.hu

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Girls Inc. entrepreneurs pitch their companies - BusinessWeek
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Filed under: Estates

The price on this one is a bit much but there’s only so much real estate on Tybee Island. Tybee Island is a wonderful vacation destination in Georgia with beautiful white sand beaches and the famed Tybee Island lighthouse. Today’s home is a classic 1928 Tybee Island beach cottage. It’s a four-bedroom home on 2.3 acres that includes 160 feet of ocean beachfront. The home is definitely older and in need of updates but it does have nice wood paneling and beautiful wraparound porches designed for leisurely summer afternoons. This home is listed at $12.9 million.

For more prime properties and lush locations, see Luxury Homes and Mansions.

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Continue reading Tybee Island, Estate of the Day

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I found what’s probably the last interview done with George Carlin, for Psychology Today.  In the article, he speaks about the creative process, how he feels like an observer of the human species but not really human himself, how he feels about foul language, and other fascinating subjects.  It’s worth reading in full.

Photo: newscom.com 

Tags: creativity, George Carlin

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