EPOS systems for Cafes – Is it still Profitable to Open a Coffee Shop?

Owning your own business and being your own boss is an aspiration for many. As a business owner, you get to make all the decisions while working mainly for yourself. If you are successful, you can spend your profits any way you want—reinvest in your business growth, go on an extended holiday, buy a house, the world is your oyster!

One of the most significant barriers to entry in entrepreneurship is the uncertainty of a return on your investment. After all, it takes a considerable amount of capital to get a business off the ground. You want to ensure that you will be getting that money back, and then some.

Opening a coffee shop is a popular entrepreneurship dream. However, some hopefuls dismiss the idea immediately because there’s no way a coffee venture can be profitable in 2021; not when you can find dozens of independent and big-brand coffee shops around every corner. Right?

Coffee drinkers worldwide consumed 166 million 60 kg bags of coffee in 2020—that’s nearly 10 billion kilograms in total. In the UK, the number of independent operators and branded coffee chains continue to rise at 7,000 and 8,000 shops respectively.

UK consumers drink 95 million cups of coffee per day, making the market ripe for any aspiring cafe owners to enter the scene. It is still possible to tap into this booming market, especially as younger generations begin to explore the world of coffee. Even with international chains dominating the local coffee industry, it’s not impossible for a new independent shop to make consistent, solid profits.

Opening a coffee shop in the UK can be very profitable through a lot of strategy, hard work, and luck. Of course, you will need to make thousands of decisions long before you open for business. This checklist of tasks will grow into thousands more in day-to-day operations. Nevertheless, if you are determined to make your dream a reality, your effort will pay off.

The planning stage of your business is crucial for a smooth opening. You should have all the mechanisms and systems in place, so you don’t have to deal with daily headaches once your coffee shop is up and running.

One of the most essential retail infrastructures to have is a robust EPoS system. It’s not just for cashiers to punch items out; it’s an important tool to make sure you have accurate, up-to-date information on every step of your business process.

Easitill’s Retail EPoS Systems include the following features:

Stock Maintenance – This Lets you import stock data from spreadsheets, automatically update product prices, and deliver stock level data to suppliers.

Customer Management – Tracks all customer data, processes and sends account statements. It can also customise pricing groups and loyalty schemes.

Sales Reporting – Computes total sales amounts per item, calculates profit amounts, generates sales reports, and determines daily peak periods.

Till System – With over 3000 programmable buttons, it can print barcoded receipts, track stock levels and physical locations right from the till.

Franchise Options – Shares stock data and control stock across multiple shops in different locations through centralised customer database and handle site-specific pricing.

It’s not an exaggeration to say that coffee is a religion for many people all over the world. Caffeine addiction aside, many coffee enthusiasts enjoy participating in coffee culture, whether it’s through brewing their own speciality roasts at home or exploring every new coffee shop that turns up in their area.

If you want to run a profitable and successful coffee shop, it’s important to remember that it’s not just about the coffee. Yes, the modern coffee consumer wants a good cuppa, but they expect all the bells and whistles surrounding it, too. For example, you need to create the best atmosphere to bring customers to your door. This priority in creating an appealing experience encourages them to keep coming back.

Working adults drop by their favourite shops for coffee and breakfast in the morning. By mid-afternoon, you can expect students to hunker down and finish their schoolwork until the late evening. Then, when the dinner hour rolls around, even more people will flock to a coffee shop to socialise and wind down at the end of the workday.

This is just a rough sample of the type of customers you can attract once you open your shop. It’s important to maintain an atmosphere that accommodates all of them and more. If you appeal to a broad audience and provide good service, you should be able to find success in your area.

What Products to Sell

Profit is easy to calculate; it’s just revenue minus expenses. However, ensuring the long-term profitability of your coffee shop is a bit more complicated than that. Here’s a rough costing example for one cup of coffee:

A 1 kg bag of coffee bean costs £15

You can make around 120 cups of coffee out of a standard 1 kg bag

Therefore, the base cost of making 1 cup of coffee is around 12p

In the UK, the average cup of coffee costs £3

All of this means that your profit margin for every cup is around 95% before factoring in taxes, a takeaway cup’s cost, added ingredients, and other factors. Given such a high-profit margin, it’s a wonder that there aren’t twice as many coffee shops lining every street.

The problem is that a £3 cup of coffee is one of the most low-value items you can sell today. If you factor in the costs of renting a commercial space, utilities, and labour, not to mention the initial capital you spent long before opening your shop, you need to sell several hundred cups of coffee per day to maintain a profit.

This is why most coffee shops sell a wide variety of other products, too. The most obvious choice is to include several food items on the menu. If customers are sitting down to drink their mocha latte, they will want a snack along with it. If you can source delicious cakes, cookies, and other baked goods, you will essentially double your profit with every customer.

Remember that product quality will dictate your success. After all, customers don’t have to be connoisseurs to decide whether or not a cup of coffee tastes good. If you provide high-quality products along with friendly service, your business can go a long way.

There are over 7,000 independently-owned coffee shops across the UK, and they are catering to a growing audience of coffee drinkers across all ages and demographics. There is tremendous profit potential in opening a coffee shop; you just have to plan thoroughly and set yourself up for success from the very beginning with the right tools by your side.

If you’re looking for complete EPoS systems in the UK, Easitill is here for you. We were founded in 1988, and over the decades, we have developed EPoS solutions that can accommodate your retail, hospitality, and other industry-specific needs. Get in touch with our experts today!