Not every business will be suited to high street traditional retailing.
For example, since writing the first edition of this book the owner of our local record shop advertised his business as up for sale. At the time I was interested in the property, not because I wanted to open a record shop but because the location of his shop was in my view ideally suited for our business. When I approached the owner about taking over the property and not the business, he told me he had already sold it.
At the time I wondered who would want to buy a high street record shop given that even the biggest multi-retailers were having a very difficult time competing against online companies, many of whom were operating outside of the UK.
A few weeks later, a local radio DJ announced he was the shop’s new owner and of course he was ideally suited to take the business to the next level. Sadly, the business has now closed its doors. At the time of shutting up shop the owner pinned a note on the door giving the main reason for closing the business as unfair online competition.
This competition wasn’t just from UK online shops, but those based abroad who are able to post CDs to the UK VAT-free. Thus the benefit to the retail customer is that they’re buying a product at substantially less than they would have to pay for the same product in the UK. So who could blame them for sourcing CDs online?
There’s little point in debating the legalities of this or the moral issues and so on. What’s important to you at this time is to ask yourself whether or not whatever you’re selling, or proposing to sell, is suitable for the traditional retail model.
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