If your business closed tomorrow, what would your customers have to do differently? Their answers can show you what to protect as you grow.
Imagine a café across the street from a hospital. It opens at six. A nurse finishing her night shift orders breakfast, takes the seat by the window, and catches the 6:25 bus home. She does this most mornings.
If the café closed, she could pack breakfast and eat it at the bus stop. She’d have to find somewhere else for the twenty quiet minutes she gives herself between work and home.
The owner can see her order in the sales report. To understand why she comes back, the owner would have to ask about the rest of her morning.
Ask about the last time someone chose you
Pick three customers who have returned recently. Ask each one to walk you through the last time they bought from you. Start with what was happening before they decided to buy.
- What brought you to us that day?
- What would you have done if we’d been unavailable?
- What did buying from us make easier for you?
Write down the workarounds people describe. One person might wait in the hospital lobby. Another might take a later bus to stop somewhere else. If several regulars would have to rearrange the same part of their morning, check how often that routine shows up. Who comes in before seven? What do they order? How much time do they have?
Decide what to protect as you grow
Suppose the owner is considering opening an hour later. The first hour brings in a handful of orders and takes two people to run.
If the early regulars mostly order the same few things, the owner could try a shorter menu before seven. For a week, the café could staff that hour with one person and track how long customers wait, what they buy, and how much the shift costs. The owner can then see whether there’s a way to keep serving those customers and make the hour pay.
If the owner wanted to open a second café, I’d spend a few mornings near another hospital before looking at leases. Where do people go when the night shift ends? When does the next bus leave? A twenty-minute gap that workers already try to fill would give the owner a specific reason to consider that block.
Think about a change you’re considering this week. Who would feel it first, and what would they have to do differently the next time they came to you?