Five Minute Friday: Should You Open a Second Boutique Location? (Part 2)

All right, it's Sarah. I'm back with the Boutique Hub to continue to talk about this question of should I expand my business? Should I open a second location? Or should I go deeper and bigger with an online store? Guys, first I want you to answer one thing: are your operations and your projects in line? Operations are something that, you know, they're kind of boring. You don't really like to talk about them very much, and honestly, we kind of like to skip over them and get on to the bigger, better, fun things like projects. But I want you to look at your operations and your business almost like your car, right? Your car is great as long as it has fuel in it. If it has fuel in it and air in the tires, we can go somewhere. Otherwise, it's just a beautiful thing sitting there. Looks great, but functionally it's just not going to work. And a lot of times in business, we see opportunity, we see that blank storefront, or we, we see a share in the marketplace that maybe you know, hasn't been tapped into, or we see a new line that we want to bring into the store to attract a brand new type of a customer. Whatever it is, we want to go and do these things because they're fun. Often we get to buy different inventory for that, and buying is fun, right? But go back and remember, we're investors. We're not only investors of our money for inventory because we want to return on investment for that, but we're also an investor of our time, and that time is fixed. So look at those operations in your business, like the air in the tires and the gas in the tank. Look at the management systems you have in place for people, for your money, and for your inventory. Are those running efficiently, effectively? Are there leaks there? What needs to be fixed? Fix those first before the expansion and the idea of getting attracted to nice shiny objects. Because if you don't and you go after those awesome, fun, new shiny objects, right, you're ultimately bringing that back to a place that's not healthy. You're bringing that back into an operations of something that's broken. We may not have the inventory to handle that. We may not have the finances to handle that. We may not have the staff to handle it, and ultimately the energy, the gas in the tank to fuel the whole thing. So to really break that back down on a few key things to really consider before you expand, before you take on something new in a new project, think about the foundation principles of your business. And I don't want to just think about it, I actually mean write that down. I challenge you to rate on a scale of 1 to 5 how efficiently are you managing your money, what kind of debt load is this really going to mean for you What kind of time suck is this really going to be? Look at that. How well do you actually manage the people that you have? How well do you manage that inventory?

Are you—

again, I'm going to ask this again— are you just considering a second location or a bigger expansion online because you have a lot of excess inventory left over? So those are my 2 tips. So my 2 questions: operations and projects, are they in line? How are you feeling about them? How well are you managing them? If you honestly can lay your head on the pillow tonight and feel like you have those things under control, then yes, now it's time to take that next discussion about the opportunities heading your way. If not, then it's time to go back and fix those things so we can expand, so we can get bigger and grow, right? And we're gonna need help for that, and that's okay. But a good old health check on your business, that's what I'm asking you to do. All right guys, that's Sarah with The Boutique Hub. I'll be back with some more answers to frequently asked questions and tips. If you have something you'd like us to discuss, please drop it below. Thanks.

Hey guys, thanks so much for listening to 5 Minute Friday. I love getting to hang out with you here on the podcast. As always, if you love this episode, send me a message, AJ Alderson on Instagram or @theboutiquehub, and I would love to chat with you, hear your feedback, and hear what you're doing while you're listening to the episode. If it was impactful to you, please share it with a friend or subscribe and leave a rating and review wherever it is you're listening to podcasts. You guys, I appreciate you being here. Thanks for showing up. Have a great rest of your week, and I'll see you next week on 5 Minute Friday.