GSB-29: Progress Report For March 2016: On The Actual Business Evaluation & Sales Analysis of a Real Store

Gas Station Business 101 Podcast - How to Start, Run and Grow a Successful Gas Station Business

First, an important announcement, Almost in every episode ask my listeners to go on my site and post a question on under "Ask Shabbir" tab where you have to register first, and many of you told me that you have had issues registering for it. So I decided to make it easier for everyone.

I just started a Facebook group where you can go and start a conversation, ask questions and just engage in conversations. It's called the GSB Community. Since everyone uses Facebook anyway, I figured this is the best and easiest way to solve the issue and get everyone in one place. Now to find my Facebook group, simply go to ShabbirOnFacebook and it will take you straight to my group, off course if you have to ask to join the group just once but after that you can invite your friends, and you can get them approved. Sounds fun? Let's try and see how this will work.

Now to the show.....

On Episode 23, I brought you a real life store sales data and analysis, where I was helping a group of buyers decide if they should buy a location or not. If you recall, in that episode I published the real sales figures of the store and some projected ones as well. Based on their sales data I created some P&L's of my own and it showed for the month of October the seller had lost about $2500. But despite the fact that the store was losing money, I did go ahead and recommended that they buy the store based on few factors which I discussed in that episode 23 as well. If you recall, in that episode I discussed few issues, and few opportunities of the store and we covered 9 points:

1. The store and its location
2. Demographics
3. Age and brand
4. Physical inspection of the store and the issues we noticed
5. Recommended upgrades and how much those upgrades would cost
6. Indoor Issues
7. Outdoor Issues
8. Sales and financials
9. Projected P&L vs. Real P&L

So time now to report on the actual progress report of that store and how it is doing actually. I am happy to report that the store has done truly well, and to my surprise after implementing some of the suggestions I made, the store's performance passed my imagination to a degree.

To have a clear understanding of what this business is currently doing, I urge you to go to my blog and download the March sales data along with the actual March P&L so you can see what I will be talking about. Here are the links to all the spreadsheets

March Sales

March P&L

Difference in profit

To get the actual picture, I will be comparing both last October's and this March's P&L side by side so I can address what and how the store is making money and went from Red to black.

Strategies we implemented:

1. Address all maintenance issues
2. Upgrade all lighting and put a fresh coat of paint
3. Clean up the store
4. Remerchandising the store based on its traffic flow
5. Bringing in products that sell in the area
6. Advertise heavily via reader board, pump toppers and on the front door
7. Bringing in EBT and money order
8. Implementation of new fuel and merchandise pricing strategy
9. Full on marketing and promotional campaign

As you can see it was not one single strategy that made the business profitable but a combination of many factors. It was not an easy task, but the credit goes to the management team of the store who were able to follow directions and implement everything we suggested for the store.

I will have another update from this store in about couple of months again so we can all see how the store is performing and if the sales and profit hikes are short-lived or not.

Good luck to the buyers and I am positive if they continue to do what they are doing now, this store will perform even better.

Okay now as for answering emails, I have decided to dedicate one episode every so often to just answering email questions this way I can separate them from the rest of the shows. Soon I will have a Q&A episode all dedicated to answering your email questions so stay tuned.

The book I want to recommend today is call Work Rules! By Laszlo Bock. It is a New York times bestseller as well as Wall Street Journal best seller

Laszlo is the head of people operations in Google, and if you know anything about Google you know they have the best work environment where no one bosses them around about what to do, but most employees are self-motivated to do the wonders they do every day. There is a lot to learn about people and how to motivate and transform them into self-driven unique individuals. I think it is a great read, and I know you will learn a lot from it. So enjoy it.

Lastly do not forget to sign up for my newsletter by clicking the sign-up button on my blog. I will see you on the next episode.

Cheers