Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Risks: armed robbery, shoplifting, dishonest employees, organized crime demanding protection money or controlling your alcohol source.
Unpleasant: drunks in the store, homeless standing outside begging.
If you think being located in a nice area will prevent shop lifting and robbery, you are in for disappointment.
Groceries and big box stores are taking over alcohol sales in many areas. It's a pretty safe bet that a store for sale for $20,000 isn't making any money.
Medical field will be recession proof for awhile. Baby boomers are aging and uncle Sam is picking up a lot of the tab so there is money to pay for it.
I have been involved in wholesale and retail for several decades, and I can warn you in advance, absentee ownership of a retail ( mostly cash) business is not a good idea. When you hire other people to count your money, it usually doesn’t turn out too well.
I have provided services, in and around the liquor store business, and the successful ones have the owner on site or at the very least in the store almost daily.
And I hate to throw cold water on all of your dreams, but hiring and working family, that is almost always a recipe for disaster. Just wait until you need to fire a family member for whatever reason, then the real “family dynamics” start to brew.
I am a very optimistic person and have seen lots of successful businesses and been a part of several. So I am just giving you my observations from a few decades of experience.
A very smart person, gave me some advice when I was starting out in being an entrepreneur. “Never buy a business, that you know nothing about.”
One more thing that I see as an issue, I can’t fathom a successful liquor store selling for $20-25k. Not saying you couldn’t make it successful with your marketing experience. Just saying,it would be difficult at a distance.
Pizzerias do well in either economy. In NJ, folks in Chapter 11 bankruptcy will often borrow and raise cash to run a pizzeria for a few years to get back on their feet. It's alot of work, but has a high success rate.
I have been involved in wholesale and retail for several decades, and I can warn you in advance, absentee ownership of a retail ( mostly cash) business is not a good idea. When you hire other people to count your money, it usually doesn’t turn out too well.
I have provided services, in and around the liquor store business, and the successful ones have the owner on site or at the very least in the store almost daily.
And I hate to throw cold water on all of your dreams, but hiring and working family, that is almost always a recipe for disaster. Just wait until you need to fire a family member for whatever reason, then the real “family dynamics†start to brew.
I am a very optimistic person and have seen lots of successful businesses and been a part of several. So I am just giving you my observations from a few decades of experience.
A very smart person, gave me some advice when I was starting out in being an entrepreneur. “Never buy a business, that you know nothing about.â€
One more thing that I see as an issue, I can’t fathom a successful liquor store selling for $20-25k. Not saying you couldn’t make it successful with your marketing experience. Just saying,it would be difficult at a distance.
Good luck with whatever you decide.
Thanks for all the input everyone.
Several good points. The reason why I say Liquor store is that in certain States (mainly in the Northeast like in NY/PA) you cannot sell Liquor in Supermarkets or Grocery stores by state and/or county law. I do not see that changing anytime soon. When I was in PA and trying to underage drink it was virtually impossible to get liquor because the liquor licenses they hand out within city limits is incredibly restricted and they class beer/wine separate from hard liquor.
In NY suburbs it is very common to go to a specific liquor store or order delivery from a liquor store. I think it has to do with your State's liquor license laws and how stringent they are. I am trying to leverage this regulation to my advantage as it does insulate you against competition to a certain degree. The market entry barrier is fairly high. Yet if you have some knowledge about how to run a business then you can excel much better than the current crop of owners out there. Most of these owners do not have a degree and don't have the fundamentals of marketing principles they just went in their all willy nilly and somehow lucked out (to a certain degree).
That being said, I do understand retail storefront has liability and risk but if I can put only $20-50k into something and use my business acumen to clean up the operations, books and add value then improve the cash flow with my marketing (with the Wife handling Branding, Graphic design and Web development) then basically I want to milk it for a while have Pops check on the shop a few times a week and hire a few hourly part-timers in shifts. Then eventually re-sell for a profit. (For $200k instead of the $20k I bought it for.)
These days you can have the Wi-Fi cams so people thinking that the workers would steal money well they can't. I'll be watching from my phone at random times and also sending Mom a URL so she can watch from her tablet as well
Also in case of theft I'll have it automatically record the last 48 hours and spend the money to get the crystal clear one so Mr. Thief's face will be in 3000x pixel quality and he'll get the 15 minutes of fame he was always looking for
There are many payment apps you can use to track the business income from the POS terminal remotely every time I get a sale I'll have an automated e-mail delivered to my inbox pipeline it into a bookkeeping app and determine if I'm on pace or not. If some funny business is going on I'll know from the alerts I set up that will say "Hey you're under by $1k for the past week" (which may or may not be a big variance depending on the shop).
In my day job I do budget tracking/pacing weekly for marketing budgets as well as pacing reports for sales goals so I already have the proper habits ingrained.
I wonder though if maybe it would be possible just to have a Liquor delivery service for rare imported products and then just mark up by a huge margin. Maybe a warehouse would be cheaper than retail storefront but could be more difficult to keep an eye on.
My challenge with other business ideas has been the resources required to creating market demand for a new product or service.
With liquor I do not need to create demand it is already there and is going nowhere. It is not complicated and easy to understand. I just have to position myself correctly from a marketing standpoint get the right promotions in place, and form relationships with regulars and locals in the community. There are a lot of nuances that the current crop of business owners don't get that I could use to stand out and differentiate myself.
With another business idea, a non-retail operation may seem to be a good idea but the reality is liquor is controlled and regulated so this is why it is the exception when it comes to retail operations - It won't go the way of the dinosaur yet. Because if you don't have a storefront associated with your liquor license they probably won't let you sell liquor direct to consumer. They need to have a place on the books they can "audit".
Do you know how much a liquor license cost I know in Michigan it could cost you $20,000 or more and $600 a year to renew it, and it takes a long time to get on also. So saying you want a liquor store is not that easy and you also need a business license that has to be approved by the city. And if Trump inacts these tariffs certain liquor could cost a lot more. And then you need to have heavy insurance coverage especially for someone breaking in and you need a good security system also.
Regarding laws ...they change. Colorado just had a big change in liquor laws so now Costco, Kroger etc can sell liquor.
In Michigan Costco and every other major grocery stores are selling liquor and have been for years. But liquor is regulated by the state.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
