Playing Pretend: Developing a Concept

Now that you have taken the time to develop a name and brand icon you may want to trademark it--my lawyer recommended that I do for Kinsai.

But we're only going to briefly talk about Trademarks here, because honestly it's so confusing and convoluted you should hire an attorney to navigate the process for you. Generally most businesses only need a trademark (for the icon and name) if they intend on creating a brand with multiple outlets or streams of revenue.

Search the TESS see if your Trademark is available online here: http://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/

Example: The Roca Brothers of the award wining "El Celler de can Roca" do not have a trademark for their top 50 restaurant, however they do have a trademark for their soon to be announced series of Ice Cream stores. 

But note just because you have a trademark it doesn't give you the right to remove a previously owned domain squatter. If the website was up before you trademarked or has been in business before you trademarked, they have the right to keep it and sell it to you at any price they wish (the guy who owns www.kinsai.com is from Korea and wants me to pay $25,000.00 for the rights, an expense we can't justify when opening--honestly I'd rather buy two Rational ovens then have a domain name).

Flushing Out the Concept

Now that you have a name, had it registered, and designed a logo, you've already completed the first major hurdle that most people are either too afraid to do or end pay far too much to have someone else do it for them. Now comes the fun part: planning your dream restaurant. Enjoy it.

When developing a concept there are two major schools of thought: 

1) Find a opportunity and develop a concept based upon that opportunity.

2) Create a concept and find/create the opportunity to support it.

With Kinsai we didn't have a home to start and I didn't just have a few million dollars in my bank I was willing to spend, so we had to create the concept first then find the opportunity to support it. Not an easy task, I found it helpful to:

1. Determine what cities we wanted to open in.
2. Determine what style of cuisine we wanted to execute.
3. Check out the competition creating a similar style of cuisine.
4. Do a demographic study of the neighborhood.

So currently we are biding on a new space right off of Massachusetts ave, between Central Square and MIT. So let's use that as the example.

1. We've determined to look into Cambridge (my home city).
2. We've determined that we would like to cook Chinese cuisine.
3. Create a Competitive Analysis of all restaurants within a mile radius: Our Template is here
4. Looked at area demographics:

• http://www.city-data.com/neighborhood/Central-Square-Cambridge-MA.html
• http://www.cambridgema.gov/~/media/Files/CDD/FactsandMaps/profiles/demo_profile_neighborhood_2013.ashx
• Then probably the most IMPORTANT step was to speak with the Cambridge Economic Development branch (Pardis is awesome) and got the local business demand profile  - Note if you are a Cambridge resident all small business classes and help are free from the city. Including review of business proposals and even copies of Quickbooks (including a free introductory class).

With that information we can develop who represents our target demographic, and what the target 'average check' will be in the area (given the competition). The first baby steps towards creating the business plan--my favorite part.