Get a Hair Cut - An Explanation

This is not a blog of complaint. Not at all. This is me just trying to give an insight into the life of a cafe/business owner. I am continually flattered by how much this happens though and how many people ask and how many people care, it is wonderful. But it also puts a kind of pressure on that I wish to convey here.

So imagine, a long while ago, you got a great haircut. Like a really, really good one. Then, every week since then, sometimes two or three times a week, sometimes two or three times a day (!), people ask you this. ‘When are you getting another hair cut?’

It’s like this:

• That’s a wonderful haircut, are you going to get another one?
• So, when are you going to get another haircut|?
• I really like this haircut, but you should get a haircut near my place, it’s a great area for haircuts
• I like your haircut so much, I want to start a chain with you and invest all my money in your haircut
• You must be ready to get a haircut then?
• Your’e so lucky, this haircut has been great for you, when are you going to get another one?
• Can you get a bigger haircut? This one is so good, you need to expand it.
• You must be really proud of your haircut.
• Can I sit down with you and learn all about your haircut?

So I wonder if people asked you that often about getting another haircut, would you go. ‘OKAY, OKAY!! I’ll get another haircut! Just stop asking me!’ Damn.

But the problem is, the person who gave you that great haircut is not available, or is really hard to get in contact with. And you wonder, can I replicate that amazing haircut again? Do you just rush out and get another haircut, or do you wait, and plan, and save and plan, for the next amazing one.

So then I wonder, if when this happens to people in business, do they sometimes rush into things and open a second or third business and expand too quickly. Because so many business books I read say just that, that people get carried away and open too many too quickly and then fail.

A customer a long time ago asked if we were going to expand and I replied not yet, he said ‘Good, it’s much better to have a gold mine than ten holes in the ground’.

Opening a second business takes a lot of planning, systems, infrastructures, procedures, trust, valuable staff and money. Planning for Kaffeine took two years, and in recently reading Danny Meyers book ‘Setting the table’, he talks about taking three years from idea to fruition for one of his new businesses.

Opening a second business is so exciting, for everyone, for the staff, for the customers, for you. But for me at least, we are not rushing into it, we are waiting for our special hairdresser to be ready again. In the meantime of course we are planning and saving to go visit him, it might just take a while.

So if you are reading this, I hope it made you smile, and please keep asking about my potential new haircut, because it is exciting and flattering and I love to talk about it.

Peter Dore-Smith
Director
Kaffeine Ltd
66 Great Titchfield st.
15 Eastcastle st.