 Do you wanna start your ice cream shop? Well, you're in luck because today we're gonna be going over how to write a business plan for your ice cream shop. So make sure you guys get a piece of paper and pen and paper ready so we can dive in right now. Hello friends, my name is Wilson, your friend in helping you build a profitable small business and a thriving food business. If this is a video that you guys enjoy and you find valuable about, then make sure you guys smash the like button because it's gonna help the YouTube algorithm to show it to more people. That just shows me that this is the type of video that I should create more of. Speaking of ice cream, it is something that I am madly in love with and the fun fact about me is that I've created two ice cream businesses in my lifetime. First one, when I was 17, it is called Tropical Paradise. I do not know why I created this with my best friend, ran it for a year and then stopped running it. The second one was when I was 27, 10 years later, we went and created another ice cream shop called 720 Suites. Five years later, it got acquired seven locations. So something that I truly know a lot about and I have a lot of passion about because at the end of the day, it is all about putting smiles on faces and delivering happiness. So now that we know you wanna create your ice cream shop, first thing we need to do is to write a business plan. Why a business plan, you may ask. The first reason is for you to be able to raise funds. How do you raise funds? Because at the end of the day, when you're asking people for money, you must show them you have a plan to get the money back. You must show them how and when you're gonna get the money back. The more detailed you are, the more bases you cover, the more clarity and the more confidence that these people you're raising money from would be able to recoup their money and that's more chances for you getting your funding, whether it's from friends, family, the banks or any type of grant. That's the reason why you must start off with a business plan. The second reason why you must start off with a business plan is so then that way you can find your dream partner. This is a crucial moment because at the end of the day, you have this crazy idea in your mind that you wanna bring to the world and for you, you must be able to put this idea on paper and to show other people of your vision. So then that way, they can either decide to buy in or not to buy in. Now this way, you can attract really talented people to join your team and to build out this vision of yours together and at the same time, when you're able to write your business plan, you're able to actually write down your own values to see how you wanna do things, how you wanna grow this and when you find the right person that believes in the same idea, that has the same values, that's when you can create a dream team. And lastly, this whole business plan is basically your map. You're trying to conquer a mountain, but then yet, while you're driving, you do not know the turns, the straights, the highways that you need to take and that's the reason why you must have a business plan because this becomes your map to this mountain. When you are building your business, there are gonna be 10 million things that you're dealing with all at once from building up your location to marketing to identifying who it is to product the development, to dealing with city, renovations, all this good stuff. And when you're dealing with everything, it is so easy to miss sight on what is it that you're trying to achieve. What is your way to make money? What is your way to recoup your costs? And that's the reason why you must have a business plan so then that way you can always reference back to this business plan, so then that way you can cut through the noise and look at your path to success. Now, as a disclaimer friends, this is basically all the essential parts that you must cover in your business plan. And it's not only limited to this, I'm just bringing and sharing with you the most essential part that you must focus on. Now, let's dive right in. The first thing that you must have clarity on is the concept. What type of ice cream shop are you trying to create? Is it gonna be a dine in experience? Or is it gonna be a mobile food truck? Or is it gonna be a grab and go? Are you gonna be selling gelato, yogurt, soft served or sorbet? These are all things that you must identify right from the beginning. By you identifying this, this will lead into the equipment that you need, the spacing, the budget, the team, the marketing, everything leads into that. And that's the reason why having the concept is so, so important right from the get go. At the end of the day, we must understand this concept that we're building is a solution to someone else's problem. Once again, I repeat, whatever you're building is a solution to someone else's problem. Now what do I mean by that? Well, 720 suites, the ice cream shop that we created, we created this concept as a soft served experience, as a dine in experience, so then that way we can cater to the young Asian millennials because at the end of the day, they're trapped inside their campus for a long time. They're looking for places to hang out, to feel belong, to go and actually snap pictures, so then that way they can post on their Instagram. And we believe that smoke coming out of ice cream, soft served specifically, is gonna be that solution to the problem of these young Asian millennials, not feeling that they have a place to hang out, not feeling that they're belonging to a group of community. That's what we're trying to solve. And that is the concept that we went with and that's why we were able to really target this demographic. In addition to that, because we know this is the problem we're solving and this is the concept that we're leaning in, we also went and created flavors that served our demographic. We're talking about milk tea flavor ice cream, green tea flavor, Taiyaki, we also served bubble tea and different types of waffles too, that were popular amongst this demographic. The second component that you must have in your business plan on the same vine is your target market. As I was saying, your business is a solution to someone's problem. Now whose problem are we talking about? Everyone has different types of problems. So you must identify the specific group of people because they all share the same common problem. As an example with 720 sweets, the problem we're trying to solve is to help these young Asian millennials feel belonged, have a place where they can come hang out and take Instagram worthy pictures. And that's the reason why we know that our concept and the food that we serve, that the core renovations must be able to solve this problem. By us identifying this target market, the young Asian millennials, everything else falls in place. That's the reason why in our shop we have these really nice custom made murals, wall murals that allows people to come in, take pictures of and send it to their friends. And also we created different types of experience that really allowed these young Asian millennials to get wowed away. This way they can feel belonged and have an uplift in their status. As the first ones to share this amongst their friends. You must be able to identify and clearly profile this target market of yours right from the get go even before you're selling. We're there to take the most educated guess and oftentimes we can be wrong. However, this is a benchmark of how we can pivot moving forward. We must be able to identify them as one person. We're talking to one person for us as our target market. We target Michelle. She goes to post-secondary university at UBC. She is 19 years old. She works a part-time job at H&M and the brands that she enjoys wearing are Ritzia, H&M, Lululemon. She loves going to travel around the world to experience different things that life has to bring her and some of the things that she values are status, values of their family and values of their friendship. We were going deep into this customer profile. By us identifying all these things about Michelle, now our marketing can fall in place. Now we know exactly how to speak with her. Now we know where she hangs out. She hangs out on Instagram a lot. She hangs out on TikTok a lot. These are the places where we get to market to her. That's how we get to talk to her. By you identifying your target market, this allows you to be able to create a business that can thrive. And by you being able to identify your customer avatar in this precise manner, your investors, when they see this, you know what, they're going to feel that whether this is in line with what their assumptions are or they're going to be completely blown away by the detailness that you have and the thoughtfulness that you have in your business. So this is a really crucial area when it comes to creating a business plan. Now if you want to learn more about how to identify your customer avatar and be able to connect with them so then that way they can buy from you over and over again and then creating campaigns that keeps more and more people coming up to line up at your door, then you must attend this free seminar that we're hosting. It is a masterclass over an hour long of free training specifically for you. So make sure you guys sign up at the link below. The next component that you must have in your ice cream shop business plan is your team. You must include the background of your team and why this is the dream team to make this concept successful. What you include in the background of these individuals, it does not have to be some crazy credentials. They do not need to be graduating from a really well-known university. No, what we include are the advantages that would make you much more successful. What would them bring to the table that would make your team the dream team? There are three things that you must consider when putting it in the background of your team. First up it is a skill set. What kind of skill set do they have? Are they able to fundraise for you? Are they able to know social media really well? Or do they know how to make really good ice cream, culinary background? Second is resource. Do they have the resource of a lot of money that can support your business? Or do they at the time? Or do they know an uncle that is in the industry that can teach you and share with you the insider knowledge? And lastly, the connections. Do they have connections that are with bankers, consultants, foodie per nurse? The last thing that you would wanna do is to highlight the fact that they are your best friend, your spouse, your family member, because none of these things are skill set and value that they bring to the table that can propel and make your business more successful. And a lot of people struggle with this point because they just don't have the experience, they don't know what they're good at. It is okay because at the end of the day you don't need to experience as long as you have the heart, as long as you have the time, the commitment and the passion, or the fact that you are just a visionary of the business. It is okay too. Look at your past experience and see what are the some of the skill set of what you've done before that is translatable and relatable to what you're trying to build right now. A quick example with some of the 20 suites. For me, when I created this business I made sure that everyone on the team had something different that they bring to the table. First up, it was my first partner Tim. He's a supplier for all our ingredients and that's the reason why he's on the team because he gives us the best pricing. Then we have Brian. Brian's my partner and he's the COO. Basically, he's the operations guy and he loves doing what he's doing and that's the reason why I bought him on board. And then the third guy, he basically just had money and we bought him on knowing the fact that he can fund the business as well. So this became a really good team because I know exactly what everyone brings to the table and highlighted that. And for me, I'm just really good at marketing and I am in touch with what my customers are wanting. That's what made us a successful ice cream shop. The fourth thing that you must have in your business plan is the location because everyone talks about location, location, location, location. Determine whether your location is right for your concept. For example, there are two types of locations. First, it is a destination location. That means people must drive over, come to you specifically just for your food item. This has a lot of friction yet at the end of the day destination locations are much cheaper in rent because you're not relying on walk by traffic. Second type of location are the high density, high foot traffic locations. Oftentimes this is in the downtown core area because why? It has a lot of foot traffic and the more foot traffic you have, the more possibility and more potential that you can convert the walking traffic into customers. And that's the reason why rent is substantially more expensive at the high traffic areas. Now, when you're choosing a location, you must understand that not just because that is a high traffic area is a good spot because you must identify whether your target market hangs out at this location. For us at 720 Suites, high traffic area location is not a good place because our students, the young Asian millennials, they are not hanging out at downtown core. So that means I don't need to choose such a premium location. I can have a destination location that is right outside of a bus stop. That's exactly what we had. This was 10 minutes away from the closest university and people were able to access. Our target market was able to access this location and that's the reason why we chose this location. At the end of the day, when choosing a location, it is all about your target market and has really little to do with the foot traffic or whether it being a destination or not. And sometimes you must be able to compromise on different types of characteristics because you must choose a location that is fitting for your budget. Do not be over your head and find a prime location and fall in love with the location just because you think it is the best. You must understand and come from a perspective of your target market. The next item that you must consider when creating your business plan is your sample menu. Now with sample menu, there are three things that you must consider with your sample menu. First up, it is a purpose. Why are you serving what you're serving? What purpose does it serve? What solution is it to someone else's problem? For example, with our ice cream, we knew we wanted to create something that allowed our audience, our target market, to feel like, wow, this is such a great experience that I wanna share with all my friends and family. So then that way, I feel good about myself and that's the reason why we created an experience for our customer. This is like the full meal deal, it is a $7 experience where there's smoke coming out of ice cream, we had condiments, and this whole thing just looked like a masterpiece because that was the purpose we were serving. So then that way, customers can come in, snap Instagram pictures. On the other hand, for our second location that was in the mall, the purpose was completely different. We were not serving the same type of demographic who wanted an experience. They wanted something to grab and go, something of a small treat while they were shopping for groceries, and that's the reason why we served a $2 cone because that's exactly what they needed when they were shopping for their groceries. So here you see, the product that we're serving, the menu that we create must serve a specific purpose. The second thing that you must consider are the complimentary pieces. The complimentary items that would make your average ticket value higher because at the end of the day, when we're selling ice cream, we need to sell a lot of ice cream in order for us to make back the rent, the labor and the cost of good solds. And that's the reason why we must be able to maximize the money that people are gonna be spending at your location. So that's the reason why you offer waffles, you offer drinks, and you offer different types of items that would be able to increase your average ticket value. And lastly, the third thing that you must consider when creating your menu are your cost of good solds. By you understanding how much money, how much margins you're actually making from these items, it would allow you to understand whether these are good items or bad items. Are these items just to have people come in through the doors or are these items our lost leader? We must understand that and to be able to work it into our business plan. A perfect way that you can find out and validate your product costs and your product item is to survey. Something that we always do is survey, survey, survey. Every time we launch a new product or we launch a new location, we always survey around the people where we have our next location. This allows us to get much more insight from our customers. By you creating the sample menu, this is what gives your vision life because now you can actually see it. Now you can actually put things on a piece of paper on stuff that you wanna bring to the world. This is what you're gonna be able to rally your team, your investors and even yourself. Make this whole thing real. By you being able to draft the sample menu and actually push it out into the world. Next up on your business plan are your designs, your renders of what it looks like on that dream location that you have and your packaging and your logos, everything. Because this once again is what gives your project life. Everything that you have in your mind, the vision that you have is now on a piece of paper, is now on a PDF. Now you can show your investors, your team and rally everyone around that from your renovations to your interior designs. Now you can actually see what you're trying to create and how this would actually attract your target audience. Now you can actually reconcile whether this is a concept that your target market would enjoy or not. This allows you to create wall murals like we did. This allows you to create the packaging like we did so then that way we can serve our customers much better. Next up on your business plan is the SWOT analysis. Now I know this is cliche, I know this does not sound like it's really fun work but it is really crucial for your business plan. What is a SWOT analysis? SWOT signs for strength, weaknesses, opportunities and threat. By you identifying all these four areas, this allows your investors, your team and even yourself to know what your strengths are, how you can out beat your competitors because at the end of the day, for me as a strength for 720 suites, it is because I was still young, I was in the loop. I know all the influencers in this space that targets my target market, that's my strength because I'm in the loop over someone else who's in their 50s who has no touch with this type of demographic. This is my strength over someone like that. Whereas my weakness, my weakness is my distribution. That means that I cannot out beat the ice cream chains out there that has the economy of scale. That means their cost of good souls are much lower than mine because they have multiple locations, they buy things in bulk. I now know this is my weakness. Opportunities in the marketplace, well, it is because my partner and I, we know for a fact that, hey, you know what? Someone in the grocery chain is trying to expand and find a partner in the dessert industry and that's where an opportunity that we have over our competitors. And finally, threat, knowing the fact smoke coming out of ice cream is only gonna be a temporary gimmick that brings people in. Knowing this, knowing this is a threat, then we must be able to have other plans, other strategies to make sure that this threat would not kill our business. By you identifying and creating the SWAT analysis, you're covering all your bases so then that way you're not gonna be able to get hit on the left field for something that you cannot control because now you're putting into everything into perspective. This shows your investors that you are the real deal. It shows your partners that you know what, you know what you're doing and it shows you that you're covering all your bases so then that way your chances of success of your ice cream shop is much higher. What's also gonna increase your chance of success in your ice cream shop is for you to smash the like button, guys. Smash the like button because this shows a YouTube algorithm. This is the type of video you enjoy and this shows me. This is the type of content you enjoy and need so in that way we can create more of these for you. So go ahead and smash like button. Now that you have smashed like button it is time to go into the next part for your business plan and that is your marketing. You must identify all the marketing strategies that you know that you're employing to grow, to launch your business. This is when things come together by you identifying who your customers are by you knowing your location then you kind of know what marketing tactics that you can use whether it's Facebook advertisement, influencer marketing, brand collaboration, stunts, local events. These are all things that you can utilize to launch your business and to grow a thriving ice cream shop. For us at 720 Suites as an example we knew that our target market their attention span is very, very low and that's the reason why collaborations and brand deals was a really big deal for us. That's the reason why we know that we always needed to work with other companies in order to keep our brand fresh and young and relevant. That's the reason why we worked with Vitasoy. We worked with Nespresso because that's what our customers want. At the same time we knew that we wanted to utilize the media to get us our first initial launch hype. That's the reason why every time we launch a new product, new campaign we always reach out to the media to help us create the buzz so that way our customers get to see it. And if you want to learn more about marketing then you must check out our free masterclass down below in the link. Go and sign up for it because it is over an hour long of masterclass that teaches you how you can bring an idea to being a profitable restaurant. So definitely you guys go and check it out. And lastly guys, the most important section of your business plan is your financial because this shows your investors how they're gonna get their money back. That's the most important question. You must know your numbers. Some of the numbers that you must account for are your labor costs, your equipment costs, your rental costs, your cost of goods sold and now the third party commission costs as well. This is an area that a lot of people get wrong myself included because if you do not do your calculations properly, if you do not do your research ahead of time properly it's gonna cost you a lot of money. This is how we wasted more than $30,000 buying the wrong machine, having to dismantle our counter because it doesn't fit $30,000 mistake my friends. Something that you should definitely be aware of, something that you should do the research on and to account for these things. And that's the reason why a lot of people go over budget when they're doing their build out which cuts into their cash flow and their reserves which ultimately cuts down their runway. How long can they run their business for to grow and retain a loyal customer base? The more that you account for these things, the more accurate your projections, the more likely you're gonna be able to recoup your money and actually be profitable. And the more accurate and the more detailed you are with your financials, this is what gives your investors the clarity that they need in order to see how their money is being used. The more clear they are, the more chances that you are to get the funding that you're looking for. So there you go friends. These are the items that you must include in your business plan so then that way you can make a thriving and profitable ice cream shop just like we did. Go out there and make people smile. Go out there and deliver happiness because this is what this whole business is all about. I really hope that you guys enjoyed this video. If you guys do, make sure you guys smash the like button for me. Once again, it shows the YouTube gods that this is the type of video you enjoy. Otherwise, I'll see you guys in the next video.