Day 418 – Year in Review: Confidentiality of Data

I am likely stating the obvious with this post, but it is imperative that you always, always ensure any data or information remains confidential in regards to the bars you audit or even don’t audit. It is human nature for bar owners to ask you how others in the industry are doing. We are looked upon as consultants and we are always wanting to provide helpful information and add value to our service, but make sure any information you are providing is from industry resources, restaurant and bar associations or maybe consolidated BEVINCO data from your region, for example average losses or hot selling products etc. Refrain from discussing results from other clients, its confidential information between you and the client. If a bar owner asks how others are doing and you respectfully decline to speak about other establishments, they will understand, because they wouldn’t want you to be discussing their business either.

Day 404 – Year in Review: Portable Printing

Unfortunately, I have not been able to ditch my printer, and is the only piece of equipment that does not fit into my portable office (roller bag). Some of my clients have wireless internet and some do not, some prefer a hard copy of the reports handed to them when I am done and some prefer the reports electronically via email, and some want both email and hard copies if the owner wants it emailed to their Blackberry if they are not always around but want the staff to see the report right away. Because of this I carry a small laser printer along with me so that I have the ability to print when needed. With technology these days portable printers are getting extremely small and are not that cumbersome to carry anymore, for now it might be worth the investment.

Day 392 – Year in Review: Professional Attire

I believe it is extremely important to maintain a professional image at all times when completing your audits, even if it might be 5am and you don’t think the owner or staff will be there. You need to make sure that you look professional for when staff arrive, or the owner stops in to meet with you. You make the call on what the definition of professional attire is, whether it be khaki pants, or some form of dress pant and a collared golf shirt, looking professional will go along way with your clients. After all, in the beginning they are letting someone they likely don’t know (“you”) in their bar after-hours when they might not always be there, and looking professional is a big part of being professional. My staff and myself wear golf shirts with the BEVINCO logo and a casual dress pant. If things are getting a bit messy (usually weighing kegs), I also use a black apron to keep my attire clean. This also allows me to easily stop at potential clients or sales meetings without having to change or worry about my attire after I have a completed a couple of audits earlier that day.

Day 387 – Year in Review: Flash Light

Yes, a very basic tool, but it comes in handy every audit. I found a small Mag-Lite works great when you are doing beer bottle counts in a cooler where shadows can make it difficult to complete the audit and the lighting is poor. Some stockrooms are very poorly lit, and in many bars the liquor is kept in a cupboard behind the bar with little or no lighting and a flashlight is a must. I have also had the pleasure of completing an audit in the dark during a power outage and a flashlight was a necessity. This is also where making sure your laptop is fully charged before you leave the office in the morning along with your hand held scanner and of course the rechargeable batteries that I talked about earlier. You just never know what you are going to come across when performing your audit.

Day 378 – Year in Review: Equipment

A big part of getting started is purchasing all of the necessary equipment; laptop computer, bottle scale, barcode scanner, hand held scanner, keg scale and few small other miscellaneous items that will help you complete your audits. But don’t fear, the technical support group at BEVINCO Global Office does a lot of the ground work for you. They have gone through a lot of effort to research the best equipment for the job and to have performed a number of tests to make sure performance requirements are met and integration is simple. The equipment can be purchased through Global office or purchased on your own. There are some options to buy refurbished units on-line which can save you a few dollars if your start up budget is tight. Throughout the year I have tested various scales and computers that other franchisees have recommended and they all do the job without any issues. I have two simple recommendations regarding your auditing equipment; bring your equipment (except your keg scale) to the initial franchisee training because the on-site tech support will set up your equipment for you which is a big help. I did not....... and I ended up having some last minute phone calls on a Sunday with tech support to get me up and running. The other recommendation is rechargeable batteries! These scales eat up batteries quick after a week of use. The rechargeable batteries will last longer and it will save you a lot of money. Have a second set and you will never be at risk for having a dead scale.

Day 365 – 1 Year!

Time flies when you are having fun (and working your butt off). The past year of developing a new BEVINCO franchise territory has been a rewarding adventure to the say the least. There have been many ups and downs over the year, and when I think about it sometimes I would experience highs and lows in a single day. Bringing on a new clients, working through challenges with clients and the day to day issues with running a business. In just a single year I have observed and experienced significant changes in the hospitality industry, the economy, new bar trends (every week students come up with a new shooter!) and bars coming and going with the changing times. During the year I have learned what marketing initiatives work and what don’t work as well, and how to make the necessary changes to move forward to continually grow the business. Over the next few weeks I will review specific areas or concepts that I have felt made a significant impact on my successes. Feel free to leave me comments or ask me questions about the first year starting a new BEVINCO franchise.

Day 364 – Ola!

If you are thinking of starting a BEVINCO franchise and you are wondering how you can take a vacation longer than Sunday, there is a way. In the beginning it is more challenging of course, but an employee or two will make life a lot easier. Recently I was able to sneak away for some winter sunshine in the Caribbean without missing a beat. How? It takes some planning and working with your clients to ensure you are meeting their needs. Currently all of my audits fall between Monday and Thursday. To make sure the audits were still completed you can shift the late week audits earlier and double up some of the days, this will likely make a few long days by starting a few hours earlier. On the following week, the early week audits can be shifted later in the week which may double up some days and make them longer but you are then able to take time off in between weeks without missing an audit. This will obviously be easier if you have an employee to help you with the doubled up workload or allow them to complete the audit on their own. If your employee completes the audit for you, you may need to have email access on vacation to review audit results if need be to ensure the reports are completed as required. If you have clients that are scheduled bi-weekly, selecting the off week to take time off will also reduce your workload and making planning a little easier.

Day 362 – After Holiday Season Lull

The holiday season is a busy time for bar and restaurants and it might not be the best time to approach bar owners with our service. January might be considered a bit of a lull time for the industry, but not for BEVINCO franchisees’. This is when bar owners will have a few more minutes to sit down with you to discuss our service and get ready for busier times with students back for the next semester, valentine’s day and some might even be thinking about summer patio season soon, so now is the time.

Day 356 – New Year, New Planning, New Budgets

It’s January and bar owners are reviewing profits or lack thereof for the previous year. This is the time to get out there and make your presence known. Everyone makes new year’s resolutions, trying to improve on the year before, whether its losing weight or making more money, in January everyone is evaluating the year before and trying to figure out how to improve. Pick up the phone, send some emails, knock on doors or send out a new mail out, just make sure BEVINCO is considered when new fiscal plans are being developed.

Holiday Cheers to all!

Day 317 – Is There a Minimum Sales Volume?

My first answer is maybe. It really comes down to a cost benefit analysis. The industry average for losses is 20%, due to over pouring, theft etc. Just as an example, if you were to have sales of $1000 per week, the bar owner would experience losses of $200 per week (on average). If you charged $200 per audit each week and were able to eliminate the losses then the bar would break even, which might not be much of an advantage (however, we do provide several other value add services beyond reducing losses). So some would say that would be the minimum, however, if the bar has only 2 beers on tap, 4 brands of bottled beer and just rail liquor, then you can look at other pricing options to make the service more cost effective. Because the sales volume is low, the on-hand stock is low, you could likely audit every 2 weeks or maybe monthly. With such a small bar the audit price could also be lowered because your audit time will also be significantly lower. If the bar is on route to another client, this could also make it more financially viable for you. There will be instances where it just doesn’t make financial sense, but just some things to consider when prospecting for new clients.

Day 314 – Qualifying a Potential Bar

A mistake that can easily be made is to pass over on an opportunity because you think the bar is not a good candidate for the BEVINCO service. Every bar as long as they sell liquor, wine or beer can be a good candidate. There are several criteria that can be used to qualify a bar: liquor sales and volume, demographics of the patrons and bar tenders, location, type of establishment and others just to name a few. But typically it is some combination of these criteria that qualify a bar as a good candidate for the BEVINCO service. A good start to qualifying the bar is to research them and understand their business, stop in and check it out, talk to the bartenders as a patron just to get an understanding of their business. I have long standing clients that have used BEVINCO for several years and I would have never thought they were a good candidate at first glance, but a closer look at their operation revealed otherwise. Don’t assume a bar isn’t a good fit until you have information to tell you otherwise.

Day 310 – Top 10 Target List

With any business it is always good to generate a Top 10 target list. These 10 targets are usually the big fish in town, or in our case the hottest bars in your territory. They might be the biggest bar, the most popular, the “IT” spot, or have huge liquor volumes, or maybe simply have been a main stay in the city for last 20 years. My recommendation when starting out as a new BEVINCO franchisee is to generate this list, write them down, fold the paper, and promptly file it away in a drawer. You only get one shot, and when starting out you will make mistakes, from your sales pitch, to your pricing, and should you land the client, the last thing you want is have a “Top 10” client be used as a learning experience.

Day 294 – Advertisement Development

Another advantage of the BEVINCO franchise is the support of the marketing group from the global office. I discussed previously including owner directed advertisements in a sealed envelope with other marketing efforts. Personally I am not a graphic designer or proficient with graphic design software, however there are specialists at global office that can help you with designing a personalized advertisement to be used in your market saving you hours of time and costly visits to your local design studio.

Day 273 – Get Involved with Client and Prospect Events

Networking is a necessity in any business, but the best networking is getting involved with events that are hosted by your clients and/or prospects. One of the challenges with networking events is making sure the group is the right group for your business. The handy man service owner from your local networking breakfast could know a bar owner, but if you went to an event where everyone attending was related to the hospitality industry your chances of success increase exponentially. Many bars and restaurants will host golf tournaments, fund raisers and special events to bring people in the industry together. These events are like gold for service providers like us and should be attended. How do you find out about these events? Make it a habit to browse your client and prospect web pages for event postings, or better yet become a member of their page and you will receive emails when events are posted. And yet again, facebook is a great way to learn about events. If a bar has a fan page, be sure to become a member so that you will be up to date on the newest events that you can attend and you will be sure to meet people that are in need of BEVINCO.

Day 268 - More than Just Liquor Control

I have said many times before, it is a lot easier to keep a client happy than to find new client. A big part of the BEVINCO service is being a consultant to our clients. We live, breathe and experience a variety of bars, restaurants and night clubs every day, we are the experts. We provide methods and solutions to daily challenges that our clients experience so that their business remains successful. Obviously our focus is to ensure they maximize their profits by reducing their liquor losses, but we need to make sure they have all the tools they need to be at the forefront of a very competitive hospitality industry. These tools can be how to improve their lighting for the perfect atmosphere, introduce hot selling products, improved equipment or web links to new ideas and techniques. The key here is, bar owners need to focus on getting people in the door and providing them with the best experience possible, our job is to make their job easier and ensure they are have what they need to keep people coming back while remaining profitable. For example, this month is Halloween, so we provide bars with some links to creative, yet simple cocktail recipes for their big Halloween Party!

Day 247 - New Bar Listings

New bars and restaurants pop up all the time and sometimes it seems every week a new establishment opens or an old watering hole gets a facelift as a result of new ownership. This is a great opportunity to make contact and at the very least make a quick introduction. Two scenarios usually exist, the first being the new bar owner is very conscious about inventory control and ensuring profits are maximized. If this is the case then you want to make sure they are familiar with BEVINCO and the benefits we bring to the table while they are likely researching various methods and systems available on the market. The second scenario is the owner is swamped with all aspects of opening a new bar and inventory control is not on the top of the list. If this is the case then a simple introduction or a drop off of literature can go a long way. Once the owner gets the doors open and has a moment to breathe then they are more apt to meeting with you to discuss what we can do for them. In both scenarios it is very important to make contact with the owner early. A good way to do this is to frequently obtain an updated listing of liquor licenses being issued or changes to existing licenses. Check with your local liquor control board on how to obtain this list, it is key to getting the inside scoop on new bars and making sure BEVINCO is fresh in their mind.

Day 233 – Owner Objection #1

Through any sales process there will always be objections, as a service provider (and if you want to make the sale) you need to ensure you have a response to every objection. The biggest objection I receive is “I don’t have a problem”. Well if bar owners didn’t ever have a problem BEVINCO wouldn’t have been around since 1987 with nearly 300 franchisees worldwide, however this isn’t the best rebuttal to use when this objection is heard. The best thing to do is not tell the owner they have a problem or insist they do (when 9 times out of 10 they do), but rather ask a number of directed questions that will get the owner thinking about their business and systems they may currently use which can lead to opportunities or scenarios where we can help just by using the information you gathered from the owner. Let the owner do the talking and all you have to do is listen for where an opportunity may exist. After this discussion if you haven’t won the owner over yet, I like to offer a trial period to them which would allow us to complete a few secret audits without the staff knowing. The secret audits will allow you to determine if there are any issues and gather the data to back up your discoveries which will go a long way to winning the owner over and retaining them as a long term client. Something else you may consider is having the owner participate for a few minutes during the audit and allow them to audit one particular brand, say Crown Royal, that way when they review the trial data they can refer to the brand they audited themselves to give them confidence in your data and ensure we aren’t “adjusting” any numbers in our favour just to make the sale.

Day 226 - The Power of Networking

Don’t ever under estimate the power of networking with anyone from any walk of life through any means possible. It is amazing the types of contacts you can develop just by simply giving a 30 second elevator pitch to people in everyday conversations. You don’t necessarily have to network with people that work in the industry because it's “a small world” and I have made a number of great contacts over the past 6 months by simply talking to lots of people about what we do. A construction contractor just the other day gave me some great contacts from clients of his where he has completed recent renovations and my insurance agent through conversation gave me the heads up on an establishment that was discussing inventory control, which turned out to be a great qualified lead. In addition to making conversation with anyone you have a chance to talk to, social media forums are exploding and the power of facebook and Linkedin have been invaluable with building my network and getting the word out. Becoming a “friend” or “linking” to someone in the industry or having them be a follower on my BEVINCO of South Western Ontario fan page has also been spectacular as they too will be connected to many people that would be interested in our service.

Day 219 - Sales Update

Just a quick update on my blog entry from last Monday regarding the 10%
Prospecting Schedule. Since then (a week and a half) I have met with or
spoke to 12 bar owners all purely on cold calls. From those 12, one new
client will be starting next week! So it doesn't quite fit the 10% rule,
but close. From the other 11 contacts, 1 owner has indicated they would
like to start the service in the fall as business picks up after a slow
summer, and two other meetings went well and have since scheduled a follow
up visit. I will keep you updated, but the 10% rule looks like it is
holding true so far. More to come on some of the obstacles and objections I
encounter during the sales push and how I overcome them.