First Employee

getmore4less

When it is busy do people walk out so custom is lost or is it just they have to wait a bit.

As above an analysis of the footfall and customer profiles will help identify any patterns.

Is this a business where there are repeat customers that can be serviced in a different way mail order/email, local delivery service

terra_ferma

Wywth wrote: »

Whatever your friend is doing now is obviously not very profitable as you say she could not afford to pay someone else to do it.

Therefore she should restrict demand for that part of the business (e.g. by increasing her prices) and use the extra time then generated to concentrate on finding better, more profitable ways to generate an income.

I don't think this is necessarily good advice for a business that started very small.
What is happening is that the business is developing, there is a big gap between having too much work for one person, and having enough money to pay regular staff. Particularly if the owner is spending a good chunk of time developing the business.
It's part of the natural development of a business.
It's the same with premises, your current premises are getting too small, and you can't afford larger premises yet.

In these cases you suffer for a bit until you make enough money, or you find funds to invest (loan, savings etc) so that you can pay for what you need to grow the business.

In my opinion the issue is business planning, a good business plan would include the need for investment in order to develop (or not depending on the business model) but well done for the OP's friend for the success with her business.

paulwf

This is the classic problem with small business retail. Basically having two staff members instead of one makes a huge difference. With one person if a customer is in the shop and taking up time you can't do anything else. With two you can still pop to the bank, answer the phone, nip to the loo etc.

The best thing to do is probably bite the bullet and get a second staff member and work on growing the business as much as possible and as quickly as possible. Cashflow will be tight but if you don't take the leap the business will never grow. Put the employee on a zero hours contract so you can adjust their hours to suit your requirements within reason.

There may be a chance to get an apprentice which I think is around £2.65 p/h, I get about 1 call a week offering me this service. I haven't had an apprentice but I would be a bit wary of relying on one as the sole employee personally.

There are loads of ways of spreading out customer demand in retail, what works for you depends on the exact nature of the business. For example opening longer hours or more days of the week, a happy hour or discounts on a specific day.

Savvy_Sue

paulwf wrote: »

There are loads of ways of spreading out customer demand in retail, what works for you depends on the exact nature of the business. For example opening longer hours or more days of the week, a happy hour or discounts on a specific day.

Actually, that could be worth considering: say if you offered someone regular hours on a particular morning, could you offer a discount that morning to encourage more trade, or some extra thrown in on those days (eg free Gift Wrapping Service, or free samples, or whatever 'works' in her line) to encourage that day to be busier?