BYOL - Bring Your Own Lunch Cafe
BYOL - Bring Your Own Lunch Cafe
Idea Description
So you'd like to get out of the office and meet someone for lunch, but you don't necessarily want to purchase a lunch everyday! BYOL is a cafe that allows people to bring their own lunch and enjoy it in a cafe type atmosphere without the obligation of buying anything. A number of microwaves and toaster ovens would be available for free use to heat up last night's leftovers. This cafe would sell regular lunch items like soups, salads, and sandwiches as well as gourmet coffee, teas and desserts. That way people could both bring lunch as well as buy lunch. Outside of the lunch crowd there would certainly be other options to generate revenue such as a night time coffee house with local bands etc
What will you do if you win $10,000 for this idea?
Write a full business plan, take out a bank loan and put a down payment on a property in downtown Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. The location is perfect to accommodate the enormous lunch crowd, and many workers from the State Capitol are forced to eat at their desks because there is simply no cafeteria for them to utilize. Additionally, a nighttime coffee house would provide a place for underage students in the city to congregate apart from the bars, a very under served demographic. My startup costs would have to factor in cooking equipment, microwaves, tables, chairs, coffee equipment and overhead, so I would use the $10k to secure a much larger bank loan.
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Random stream of conscious thoughts: I like that you've thought about your market - state office workers in Harrisburg. I would think of other ways to make the space fun in order to lure people there. Could it be indoor/outdoor? Music? In Philadelphia, people from surrounding offices flood to LOVE Park in Center City during lunchtime. People want to see the sun while their sitting in cube country all day. They also have music in the summer. It's nice to be outside.
Great idea, and with the location being downtown Harrisburg I see this cafe as having outdoor seating and music, hopefully live from local musicians. You are definitely right on about workers wanting to get outside on their cubicle break so that would be essential.
Im down for this idea. It would be cool if were outside or even a small one room cafe with the ability to open the surrounding walls making it like a pavillion.
I like Shepp's idea about selling advertising as a possible revenue stream. If you do it tastefully you might be able to create sort of a business networking site.
you could supplement earnings by renting some space in the cafe to digital advertisers.. or organize lunch events and market it to sponsors..keeps the place fun and the additional cash wouldn't hurt