3 pages of failure

2/4/2011 7:24:16 PM

*fap fap fap*

2/4/2011 7:25:46 PM

So can you post nudes of your server girls now?

2/4/2011 7:28:51 PM

There is only one TWW user that is allowed to be a dick to his pizza customers and stay in business.

[Edited on February 4, 2011 at 7:30 PM. Reason : is]

2/4/2011 7:29:37 PM

Quote :

"Again...what was your restaurant experience going into this? "

9 years at pizza hut as a cook and driver --put me through college with a computer science degree. When I went out to find a job with the degree, employers didn't give a shit. They wanted on the job experience so they could bypass on the job training. If I didn't have experience they wanted me to go get a series of microsoft fuckin certifications which cost more money and school. I was already in 20,000 worth of debt at the time and moved to Plan B

2/4/2011 7:31:20 PM

So here's the story, and please hear me out before commenting:

I realize this thread is about running a Pizza place into the ground ....which I have not. Hear me out, maybe I can give odds of what you think running a Pizza place into the ground are.

I am in outside sales, which is currently salary+commission, but will move into straight commission starting at the beginning of July 2010. I have been in this position since July 2009. I have competition from several direct manufacturing sales reps, large distributors, and local distributors. I play trivia every Tuesday and Friday night with D, the Director of Quality at a company I used to work for (and would like to work for again some day), and his gf, N. One night we're all getting ready to leave the bar so I go to pay for my tab, and the bartender tells me Let's do something large - my debit card was declined. Confused, I ask her to Let's do something like.... try it again, again declined. By this point, D and N are looking over and I'm starting to get embarrassed. N asks me what's up, I say "There's a 1 out of 1x10^10 chance my card is being declined," D says no worries, that means there's a one in ten billion chance of my card being declined, and picks up my tab. Although super embarrassed, I was grateful because I wasn't carrying any other form of payment on me. Is that not rare enough for you?

Here are the advantages and disadvantages of each:

Direct Advantages: Immediate knowledge of new technology, no middle man mark up, one shipping bill (paid by manufacturer or buyer of goods), access to larger range of non-commodity items, control inventory, have access to many distributors that can effectively sell their goods which increases market share, and set prices of commodity they manufacture.

Direct disadvantages: Typically have 1-3 sales reps per region (i.e. southeast, mid-atlantic, northeast, etc.) limiting the number of accounts they can successfully manage/cold-call, lack physical customer service or physical technical service available to or affordable for smaller users or altogether, are sometimes not trustworthy because they will go in behind their distributors that sell their commodity to one account in large quantities (i.e. they missed a big account, and have found out about it through a distributor selling their particular product) which leads to the distributor not selling their product anymore, have too many distributors selling the product ultimately driving the set price down through deviations, possibly rely on distributors to actually sell the product, and competition from other direct sources.

I get home and check my bank account balance online and everything is normal. No unauthorized transactions or anything. I try again the next day to use my card at Old Navy, but this time brought an american express giftcard that I had with me just in case. Sure enough, debit card is declined and I pay with the gift card. I then exit the store and call my bank angrily and explain what had happened to me and asked what was up. The customer service rep told me that customers who did not have fraud protection would temporarily not have access to their accounts due to system upgrade/maintenance/IT blah blah. I was like OK.... Okay. Let's do 1 out of 1x10^15. That's a one in one quadrillion chance, and decided I'd just pay with my credit card for the next day or so, no big deal.

Large distributor advantages: have access to other commodities that go hand in hand with other manufacturers (poor example- grocery stores sell milk as well as cereal), get direct pricing, many locations regionally or nationally easing the shipping burden of buyers with multiple locations, personal service either customer or technical, many sales reps that are able to cover a broader territory, access to multiple manufacturers of the same commodity allowing to keep prices in check, service programs that smaller companies can't offer and direct providers can't match in price or value, and experts of many many commodities as opposed to one or a few.

A few days go by and I want to get a snocone at Pelican's, but they're cash-only. Based on observations from the Hubble Space Telescope, there are at least 125 billion ATMs in the universe. It is estimated that at least ten percent of all ATMs have a cash dispenser, and there are 6.25×10^18 ATMs with money in them in the universe. I go to the cashpoints ATM and put in my debit card and PIN and the machine says "Unauthorized use: card retained". The ATM ate my debit card. Pissed off, and on a Sunday, there was nothing I could do.

Monday I'm getting lunch with my bf and decided to be nice and pick up the bill, so I go to pay using my CREDIT card, and the server comes back saying my card was declined. Again, embarrassed, I was thankful to have my bf there to cover the payment. If even a billionth of these payments have Large distributor disadvantages: smaller local distributors creating price wars (think Michael Scott Paper Co vs Dunder-Mifflin), direct mfg's going in behind and stealing business, limited access to all of the mfg's (you won't find Harris Teeter name brands in Food Lion and visa versa), can't truly set prices because it's based on both supply and demand, territory management, and tough growth prospects in slower economies (this is true for direct as well really), there are some 6.25×10^9 (billion) Local distributor advantages: Typically a good ol' boy setting where the seller and the buyer know each other for years (this does happen at all levels, but mostly at the local level), local folks are right down the street and can be used in emergencies, if the local guy buys at high enough volumes then there is no shipping charge to the end user, and access to both direct mfg's and large distributors in the universe.

6,250,000,000.

Monday afternoon I go to my bank and tell them what has happened. My card was retained by the ATM because my bank statements had been returned to the bank by my mail carrier. When that happened, the bank sent a replacement debit card to my address, which was also returned. This is what I have noticed in my six months, I am sure there are plenty more that need mentioning. The way I am setting myself apart as a sales person is this: I go after the big accounts right now while I am new. The big accounts, if I land them, will take care of me while I am new and building a customer base. The money made off of those allows me to focus free time on smaller accounts that get me higher margins. I build up big accounts, I would like to have 5-10 of these, then get 20-30 medium accounts. If I lose 1 or 2 big accounts, the 20-30 medium accounts keep me afloat while I go after new big accounts. I don't really waste time on small accounts simply because they basically pay for breakfast or something really small. I found this really odd considering the address on file was my current one and I successfully receive other bills (electric, insurance, etc) there. Bank tells me they'll send a replacement card again, and give me a temp card for the meantime.

I then call my credit card company. Same story: card statements returned by the USPS, which caused them to put a hold on my card.

Aggravated, I went to the USPS station nearest me and explained the issue. They said to write a note to my carrier and put it in my box. I wrote on a post-it note two days ago "Hi, please deliver all mail addressed to jessiejepp to this box. This includes bank/credit card statements. All mail addressed to other individuals should be RTS. Thank you!" and put it in the back of my box where he/she inserts the mail. Both yesterday and today I have received mail (not for me, but for my address), but my note is still there.


I will say this, if you can't get a big account in the first 6-8 months (assuming you have cash flow that you can ride this long) you could be in a world of trouble. If you can get one, it will really make going after the others a lot more enjoyable and less stressful. I know a lawsuit for punitive damages against a federal agency isn't possible, but I was wondering what (if any) other legal action I can take in this case. It's simply just very exhausting wasting any time on anything other than big accounts in the very beginning. You work just as hard on the medium sized accounts and see 1/3 to 1/36 of the money in my situation.


Now, what are the odds that you can't run a Pizza place into the ground? If you have any other questions, you can PM me. I hope this helps in the slightest!

2/4/2011 7:34:30 PM

ahahaha epic post

2/4/2011 7:37:41 PM

That's an interesting meme mash up, there.

[Edited on February 4, 2011 at 7:37 PM. Reason : ]

2/4/2011 7:37:43 PM

Give me any odds of what you think this business failing existing is.

Let's do something large.

Let's do something like....

"There's a 1 out of 1x10^10 chance."

That means there's a one in ten billion chance of aliens existing.

Is that not rare enough for you? Okay. Let's do 1 out of 1x10^15. That's a one in one quadrillion chance.

Based on observations from the Hubble Space Telescope, there are at least 125 billion galaxies in the universe.

It is estimated that at least ten percent of all sun-like stars have a system of planets, there are 6.25×10^18 stars with planets orbiting them in the universe.

If even a billionth of these stars have planets supporting life, there are some 6.25×10^9 (billion) life-supporting planetary systems in the universe.

6,250,000,000.

Now, what are the odds that NONE of these businesses fail?

2/4/2011 7:47:42 PM

ahahahahaha, dude, kiljadn


thats the best post I've seen on here in a long while

2/4/2011 7:55:25 PM

Trolls congratulating trolls itt

2/4/2011 7:58:06 PM

Retards easily amused.

2/4/2011 8:17:07 PM

Geniuses unemployed

2/4/2011 8:17:35 PM

holy fuck. i didn't even read kiljadn's post. that is some epic shit right there.

2/4/2011 8:21:27 PM

haha damn

forgot abour kiljadn's post

2/4/2011 8:23:25 PM

Quote :

"put me through college with a computer science degree. When I went out to find a job with the degree, employers didn't give a shit. They wanted on the job experience so they could bypass on the job training."

I don't know about you, but when I took a ride through the College of Engineering, all I heard over and over was the benefit, almost necessity, of an internship or work experience before graduating. The advice was there for the taking. Internships are hard to come by, but COOPs are a dime a dozen unless you're GPA was trash. I had more than a year of experience in industry and probably made $20,000+ over the year through COOP before graduating, which paid for my tuition, apartment and living expenses. And Computer Engineering isn't very different than Computer Science, in fact, I was working with predominantly CSC guys in a software development environment.

Sounds like this is twice now that you have set yourself up to fail out of the gate by not being adequately prepared.


I'm still sorry that it happened, but there are lessons to be learned much like what merbig said last page, if you don't want to strike out on your next venture.

[Edited on February 4, 2011 at 8:39 PM. Reason : ]

2/4/2011 8:37:32 PM

Well school was a big waste of time. The teachers sucked ass at teaching. They all had tenure. They all were the sole teachers of the class so I couldn't switch teachers.
They didn't teach me anything I didn't already know. They taught us how to give oral presentations, taught us how to pitch a coding project to big dogs, but they didn't teach us anything about computer science. No wonder why software is so fuckin buggy. They successfully get the contract but then don't know how to do any of it!

2/4/2011 8:47:33 PM

That's right, it was the College of Engineering and professors' faults you couldn't find a job.

It's the cheap military's town's fault that you didnt sell enough pizza.

It's the investor's fault that you agreed to put your business in a shitty little mini-mall with no traffic.

It's the government's fault that it all cost too much and you couldn't advertise.

It's the big chains' fault you couldn't sell your pizza cheap enough.

BLAME BLAME BLAME BLAME

2/4/2011 8:53:41 PM

don't forget groupon. it's their fault too

2/4/2011 8:54:40 PM

Well, to be honest, I would be successful if one, only one, of those people to blame came through.

2/4/2011 8:55:18 PM

There's only one person you can count on to come through in this world, and that's your own damn self.

2/4/2011 8:57:01 PM

Hosni Mubarak was in business for 30 years before he failed.

2/4/2011 8:59:16 PM

falafel business != pizza business

2/4/2011 9:01:41 PM

business is business

2/4/2011 9:02:13 PM

Also, you apparently have a degree in computer science without understanding what it is.

2/4/2011 9:05:07 PM

You're right. The scary thing is there must be millions of more guys like me because I graduated with honors.

Unlike them, I didn't have a family member in the field already. My motto is:

It's not WHAT you know, it's WHO you know. WHAT you know can be learned after you get the job.

[Edited on February 4, 2011 at 9:10 PM. Reason : .]

2/4/2011 9:09:24 PM

Does anyone know or talk to user JesusChrist from Campusblender who opened his own coffee shop? How is he doing?

2/4/2011 9:13:11 PM

what pizza place did you run?

was it close to a Chicho's or Cogan's at all? (judging from you saying Va Beach, it's not close to Cogan's)

what was the name of it yo

2/5/2011 9:31:31 AM

You should have opened up a Smithfield's in Raleigh. There's no way that could fail.

2/5/2011 9:54:26 AM

So I guess sellling leather chaps at the fairgrounds didn't work vout so good I see

2/5/2011 10:00:15 AM

Quote :

"9 years at pizza hut as a cook and driver --put me through college with a computer science degree. When I went out to find a job with the degree, employers didn't give a shit. They wanted on the job experience so they could bypass on the job training. If I didn't have experience they wanted me to go get a series of microsoft fuckin certifications which cost more money and school. I was already in 20,000 worth of debt at the time and moved to Plan B"

So you decided to go into even more debt by opening up a pizza place??

I'll give you credit for at least being competent in the kitchen. But unfortunately, I think that's the one aspect of a restaurant you're safe to hire someone else in if you don't know what you're doing. The fact that you seem (just in case you're leaving anything out, I'll say "seem") to have no experience in the following areas: managerial, bartending, serving, inventory, etc...makes me wonder what made you think that this was a good idea to begin with. It's like deciding to start becoming a shoe designer when all you've ever really done is making good shoe laces (weird analogy...).

And then there's this:

Quote :

"The location just isn't good! They built the shopping center so stupid"

and

Quote :

"yeh, it's impossible to make it when I'm in a town of military people. All of my regulars leave after 6 months!"

and this:

Quote :

"I figured military are young, stupid and wouldn't like to cook. They also don't care what they eat thanks to the shitty military food so they just buy cheap shit that fills them up for $5"

Is really really sad. I hope there was more thought that went into you choosing your location. First, you can't complain about how a shopping center is built when you are the one that chose to start your business...IN A SHOPPING CENTER.

I hope you looked at some of the successful, locally run businesses and tried to do similar things. And I hope you at least talked to the owners of those businesses.

I also hope you at least are from that area. How long did you spend in the area before you decided to open up the pizza place there?

The positive you should take from this is that you made it as long as you did. Taking your previous experience and combining it with your lack of research into opening up this place, you should get a medal for keeping this place open a month. I've read a ton of your threads about this place and it seems that you were able to do this for a couple reasons: (1) you're a penny pincher, which is good in your line of business, (2) your pizza had to be at least decent, but I guess this could be overcome by it being cheap, (3) you had some decent ideas with the expanded beer list, being able to deliver beer and take it home, etc, (4) you sounded like an extremely hard worker that put in a lot of hours (although you managed to squeeze in a decent amount of t-dub time in between).

Those are some good qualities. Maybe you can take all the stuff you have going for you, combine it with everything you have learned, and be successful in your next venture if you choose to go this route again.

Whats you're plan now?

[Edited on February 5, 2011 at 10:51 AM. Reason : .]

2/5/2011 10:27:28 AM

we're in a shopping center

we do quite well

then again, we have good food

and it's pretty fun here usually

2/5/2011 10:30:41 AM

^^a well thought out and rational post.

2/5/2011 10:30:46 AM

This thread, it is relevant to my interests.

Running a small business is hard. Like, really hard. I've never worked for a restaurant, but I can only imagine how stressful that would be. I'm really sorry to hear it went south, man.

That being said, you should do all you can to learn from this. I'm not going to beat on you like some people have, but you really need to look at what's happened and take something valuable away from it. That list you posted of taxes, insurance, stuff like that, those are known costs that are easily figured before even starting a business. You can bitch about taxes and minimum wage all you want, but everybody's gotta deal with it and it's not like you've been singled out on that shit.

As an aside, holy shit, do you people know how much advertisement costs? I run a daily ad in the N&O that's about 1.5 square inches and it costs me around $3000 per month. Again, I'm not saying it's like a secret and they don't tell you until it's too late, but ads are $texas.

As for saying the CSC teachers at NCSU "suck ass at teaching", that's just fucking ridiculous. You're a grown-ass man, you need to learn to take responsibility for your own shit. I've got no doubt that getting a job in the field is hard, especially if you didn't intern or co-op, but what did you do to help yourself? What work have you done as a hobbyist? What software have you released on your own? Have you contributed to any open source projects? You don't need anybody to help you to do that, and that's real-world experience that could easily stand in place of an internship or co-op if you didn't get a chance to do that.

Again, seriously, as a person who knows how hard it is to run a small business, I really feel for you. It's fucking tough out there, especially in this economy. But don't turn this into just another time when you got screwed by circumstances that are out of your control. Take something from this, and you'll be a better, more successful person in the future.

2/5/2011 10:36:41 AM

Quote :

"Quote : "I figured military are young, stupid and wouldn't like to cook. They also don't care what they eat thanks to the shitty military food so they just buy cheap shit that fills them up for $5" "

Anyone that starts a business with this mindset deserves to fail. I have NO sympathy for you. In fact FUCK YOU, I'm glad you failed.

2/5/2011 10:37:35 AM

Quote :

"we're in a shopping center we do quite well then again, we have good food and it's pretty fun here usually"

I thought about Ruckus when I made that statement. I don't think you can't run a successful restaurant when you are in a shopping center...but you also can't complain about how the people who own the shopping center set it up. All they are trying to do is lease out space. So don't blame them for putting a cow fertilizer store beside your pizza place. They don't care about your restaurant until you stop paying rent.

2/5/2011 10:54:07 AM

^Also two very different areas demographically.

2/5/2011 10:59:42 AM

Quote :

"as someone who has owned a business for 10 years, i can promise you that you will be a failure, just based on the bs ive read here. shame youre gonna bring your poor grandma (bank) down with you. youre a dickhead. 9/20/2010 9:42:34 PM"

told you

2/5/2011 11:11:20 AM

Iop3

2/5/2011 11:23:14 AM

^^thats just wrong

2/5/2011 11:37:20 AM

Hahah, a fucking thread full of people that have never run a business trying to tell someone who has how to do it. Are you guys democrats too, because that would just be perfect.

2/5/2011 11:40:38 AM

Quote :

"so I guess that bet is over now?"

haha i never read that.

Glad I get to keep my business, I like it!

2/5/2011 12:29:01 PM

I'd like to open a chain of stores. Something like a pet store. It would be called "Shit Ass Pet Fuckers". It would be like Wal-Mart. People working there are rude to you, like "get the fuck out of here, you idiot." And dog food costs a million dollars for one can. You don't like it? Fuckin' screw, it's "Shit Ass Pet Fuckers." And also, if you come in, we'll fuck your pet. You don't have to even bring it, we'll find it and fuck it.

2/5/2011 12:40:23 PM

Quote :

"As for saying the CSC teachers at NCSU "suck ass at teaching", that's just fucking ridiculous."

This guy didn't go to NCSU. He went to ODU or something.

2/5/2011 12:45:37 PM

Yeah, I think I predicted this awhile ago.....anyways, poor management is the #1 cause of small business failures......maybe if you try again you should get a partner who knows and thing or two about running a successful small business?

2/5/2011 12:53:08 PM

When is the big "drink all the remaining beer stock" party???

2/5/2011 12:55:26 PM

Perhaps you should join the military?

Quote :

"I figured military are young, stupid and wouldn't like to cook. They also don't care what they eat thanks to the shitty military food so they just buy cheap shit that fills them up for $5"

2/5/2011 1:06:54 PM

I think they we should all rally together for one last stand. We should all go to va beach, throw a TWW party at this place, and keep him in business!

2/5/2011 1:16:21 PM

poast

2/5/2011 1:23:56 PM

set em up

I'm AstralAdvent and i approved this message.

2/5/2011 1:26:17 PM