How did you invent Fenster? Part one. A theoretical

Every day 10-20 times I am asked the question: how did you come up with the idea to create Fenster? If you answer in essence, you need to study significant sections of anatomy and psychology, because how people come up with ideas – the question is there. But we understand what these questions are about and what is meant. So sit down comfortably, I will try to explain.

Well, first of all, the prerequisites of this idea were formed by all my previous life, and I more or less told about it in the previous issues. As for the Fenster format as it is, I will try to list its components below.

Once I started thinking about coffee in the sense of: “is it possible to make money ONLY with coffee?”. This is quite a difficult task, no matter how simple it may seem.

The cost of coffee in Vienna is about 3 euros. This is something of an arithmetic mean between espresso, cappuccino, latte and macchiato. This will be our standard check per visitor. Which is much less than 7-10 euros if the cafe has cakes, buns, sandwiches and other related dishes.

To create a daily cash register similar to a typical coffee shop with food, you need to have 3-4 times more visitors. Theoretically, everything is ok. But in practice, that is why there will not be more of them, but less, because the coffee shop does not have the same dishes.

For example, in Kaffee von Sascha every first visitor from the threshold asked: “do you have croissants?”, “do you have cakes?”, “do you have sandwiches?” and so on. Every single one. The answer: “no and will not be”. And everyone leaves. And do not come back. Congratulations in reality – you have losses.

Let’s move on. People came in. They took an espresso (2 euros) and sit with laptops for 1-2 hours. Or 2-3 visitors came in, took a macchiato and sit, chatting for 2-3 hours. The checks are microscopic, and the seats are taken. There is an area in the cafe for which you pay rent and it simply does not earn on itself.

In addition, if you have an area of even 20, 30, and some even 100 square meters, then this area must be provided with light – this is the cost of electricity. This area needs to be washed and cleaned daily – the cost of cleaning products, workers or your own time. Every day. An hour or two.
Let’s add a toilet here. It needs to be there. And its size depends on the size of the coffee shop and the number of seats. So the cost of arrangement, regular cleaning several times a day and general cleaning once a day.

There is also a summer terrace. Furniture, maintenance, annual fees, sun and rain protection, and so on.

Also: dishwashing machine: detergents, cups and plates, napkins and so on.
Workers. The larger the establishment, the more employees are needed for its maintenance. Barista, cashier, waiters, cleaners and so on. If there is only one person – everything will be bad: cooking, service, cleaning, and so on.

And now subtract VAT and other related costs.

And this whole farm needs to provide cash flow with an average check of 3 euros.

Do any of the readers still think that such an institution will be successful selling only coffee? I do not.

Therefore, by going through all the factors and features of doing this kind of business, I came to the following conclusion: to prepare delicious and high-quality coffee, and to earn money on it is possible only if this coffee is “with you”. That’s right.

The only area you need is the location of your devices and a small warehouse. You will not have an extra area with all the associated costs, no toilets, and most importantly – there is no need for workers, then this is really the only possible way to make money only on the sale of coffee and coffee drinks.

After I realized this, I began to think about this idea in detail and mentally build a project of such a coffee shop in the sense of optimizing all processes in order to maximize the speed of service while maintaining the maximum quality of the product.

Actually, all this was finalized in the completed idea of creating a coffee shop in which I myself will work and which will offer only coffee “to go”. It remained to implement all this.

But, the idea of how it will function technically is not enough. It was necessary to fill it all with meaning and interest for potential customers, which you will learn about in the next issue.

And I, as always, went for coffee 🙂