Ed Bernard leaned across the table, “I receive five to ten contacts every day from people offering me good location oppo

[answerhappygod]

Ed Bernard leaned across the table, “I receive five to ten
contacts every day from people offering me good location
opportunities, most of them claim to have found the perfect spot.”
He gave a broad smile then continued, “I always ask them two
questions. Have you been to my stores? Not store, but stores. Have
you visited the Max 10 website?” Bernard did not say, but it was
clear that the vast majority of the real estate brokers who
contacted Bernard were not able to answer “yes” to these two
fundamental questions. It was also apparent that Bernard welcomed
these contacts since each carried the potential seed of a
successful business opportunity. In fact, the growth strategy of
the retail division of Bermo Enterprises, the company of which
Bernard was owner and President, depended on his ability to
opportunistically recognize locations that held such promise.
Looking down at his crowded corner desk, surrounded by baseball
memorabilia and miniature Porsches, Bernard shuffled through four
site descriptions that a broker had forwarded a few weeks before.
Through hard work and despite the odds, Brandon Ricciardi, an
associate at Vernick & Associates, had finally gained access to
Bernard. After over a year of persistent calling, Ricciardi had
convinced Bernard that he could track down a suitable site for the
next Max 10 store. Together they had toured four locations and it
was time for Ed Bernard to decide where to open his new store.
Any retail business must carefully decide where to position new
stores as location would have a significant impact on future
success. In general, the two most important factors for store
success were product and customer. The key was finding a location
that contained a sufficient customer base attracted to the type of
products offered. Many other factors, however, also influenced the
potential success of the retail business. It was crucial to
understand the customer since choosing a region, city, or even a
specific neighborhood, required thorough research of location
demographics. The type of product constrained possible locations; a
convenience store required easy access while a specialty store
might fit inside a mall, or perhaps close to other similar stores.
Other considerations were accessibility, visibility, and amount of
traffic at the site. Of course, space and building parameters were
important too; rent, maintenance, utility, taxes, and marketing
costs needed to match the business requirements. Each retail
business would necessitate a slightly different mix of all these
factors and other issues and circumstances surely played a role as
well. Bermo Enterprises’ retail division, and especially the Max 10
store, considered a wide array of factors when seeking out a new
location.
Demographic factors were crucial, and meticulous research
had to be done since the demographic picture changed across a city
and between neighborhoods. “We look for a good demographic mix,
using the 3-mile radius, a 5-mile radius is too far,” Bernard
explained. “Number one is a proper mix of ethnicities – we gotta
have a mix. I would not go into a store location with an all-white
base, or quite frankly, with an all-black base. I’m looking for a
mix, white-black-Hispanic, but with at least 40-50 percent black or
Hispanic, any combination is ok.” These are rules of thumb that
have changed over time as Bernard acknowledged, “There are
exceptions to this rule. Our Paw Paw, MI, store is in an 80 percent
white location, but it is still doing ok. But that is an old store;
I would not place a store there today.”
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