It's been almost a month now since my family opened our coffeehouse. It took us a really long time to remodel the building, buy supplies, learn the machinery, etc. My parents, sister, and I run it. My mom loves coffee and had worked as a barista before, my dad is learning coffee stuff and is the one who did the majority of the remodel, my sister took a semester off from college to help, and I just graduated college and am starting teaching in August so I'm helping this summer. We pretty much have it under control. My mom and sister know all the drinks, I know about half, and my dad knows a few. My sister, dad, and I are proficient on the cash register, and my mom is learning it slowly (but she's usually making drinks because she's so good at it!). Some of our family was really nice to help out while my sister and I were on vacation in New York (mostly on the register), but before and since then it's just been us. My dad and I do the bookwork, and we all work together to keep things stocked and buy supplies.
So what I'm getting at is that this is a family business, we're there all day, and while we are still learning, and will be for a while, we pretty much have things under control. Yet despite all of this, everybody feels the need to offer their unsolicted opinions! I've been told how to charge people, how we need to approach advertising, what we need to add to our menu, we need to deliver, we need to hand out samples, we need tablecloths (not kidding, this was seriously suggested...by someone we didn't know), we need live music, we need poetry readings, we should do karaoke....this list goes on and on and on. We receive advice from family, friends, strangers... some know what they're talking about from experience and some are just pulling out random thoughts.
Now don't think I'm overly complaining. I have probably done the same thing to other people. I know all of these people probably have the best intentions. They want us to succeed (so do we!), and I really do appreicate the support. Some of this advice has come from people who have business experience (not coffee business, but business is business is what I've heard), and some of the advice has been good advice. We had one couple come in from out of town and stop by; they had actually owned their own coffee place in another city for several years. They had even started out like us, taking things slow getting going, and they ended up with a successful business. They had a lot of good information to share, and they were so nice to take the time to share their knowledge. We really appreciated it and enjoyed talking to them!
However, besides that one couple and the fact that everyone else has really good intentions, I sometimes get really tired of people telling me how to do things! Especially if it's something I really don't want to do and they stand there for 5 minutes telling me how great it would be. Of course I'm polite and agree, but inside I'm thinking please be quiet! Or if I'm really busy or trying to figure something out and people keep throwing their opinions at me, I really just want to look at them and yell "I've got this!" We tell people all the time that we are open to ideas and would like to know if there's something they would like that we don't have, etc. So please don't think I don't appreicate good advice and constructive criticism; it's just frustrating sometimes!
Has anyone else ever opened their own business? How did you feel about the plethora of others' opinions?
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