First of all, you need to think about the type of restaurant you want to open. First of all, restaurants are grouped into three categories: fast service or fast food, midscale, where you get good food for a good price and upscale with lots of charm and fancy cuisine. It will also depend on the type of food you want to serve and the type of customers who frequent the area.
One idea is to open an ethnic restaurant, such as Italian, Mexican, French, etc. You can open an ethnic restaurant in any of the three categories, but before you decide to look at the demographics of your area. You may want to conduct a demographic survey to get information about:
o The age of customers who will eat in your restaurant business.
o What types of ethnic groups live in the neighborhood.
o Occupations and income levels near your restaurant business.
o How many people will be interested in the type of food you will serve.
o What are the needs, in terms of services or products, of people in your area? Will you get enough business in the area that you plan to put in a restaurant?
A competitive analysis will show you what other restaurant business is in the area and what type of competition they will give you. You can do this by visiting restaurants as a customer and checking the menu to find out how much they charge for food and drinks. This will help you decide how much the fare is. To start a competitive survey, you must check the phone book and the yellow pages in this area, which have a restaurant business in the same category as yours.
The type and size of your restaurant business will determine the number or size of the following:
o What you need in the line of equipment.
o How many pieces of dishes, dishes, cutlery, bed linen and napkins you will need.
o Cooler, freezer and storage size.
o How big is your house.
o How many employees should you hire?
o How much is parking.
o What you need in an advertising campaign.
What do you call your restaurant business? Choosing a name should be one that reflects what you are selling and helps you sell your products. You want all your customers to pronounce and record the name to find it in the phone book or when writing a check. The name should be more creative than the competition, and is the type of menu that you offer.
Make sure that you do not step on someone else, check whether the name you have chosen is registered to someone else under the trademark. If this is not the case, be sure to register your name with your court clerk. You should also check with the federal government to make sure that there are no registered trademarks with the name you chose. You can get a claim for using an already registered name.
