How do you start a convenience store business?
I always love chatting to fellow tech people who are finding creative ways to fit entrepreneurship into their lives. Today’s guest is balancing a full-time position in tech while also running two convenience stores, an industry I am always excited to learn more about.
Sarok Shareef is an IT Sales Executive who has always had an interest in entrepreneurship. He purchased an existing convenience store and learned so much during his first year about operations and team management. About a year later, he took all those lessons and developed a second retail concept leveraging the lessons from his first store to jump-start success with his second location.
Sarok and I talk about why he wanted to get into owning convenience stores specifically and what it was like buying an existing business. He shares some of the challenges he’s encountered with inventory, personnel, and finding the deal in the first place. And we also discuss what he would do differently if he were to do it all again as well as what he loves about his new, second convenience store + smoke shop in a different part of town.
In this episode, we’re discussing…
Why convenience stores can be a great wealth-building side business outside your day job.
Why Sarok has avoided putting gasoline in at his convenience store and why he has opted for exclusively non-perishable goods as inventory.
The challenges he’s faced with finding and keeping good employees.
How Sarok found his convenience stores and what he was looking for in his first store versus his second.
What he learned from owning and operating his first convenience store that has made opening the second one a lot smoother process.
Sarok’s Top Tips:
If you want to operate a convenience store more passively, you need good employees – it is especially important to have trustworthy management. Good employees can be hard to find and hang onto, so do your research and don’t ever hire your local, regular customers.
Owning a convenience store is a great way to see the immediate impact of your decisions – you can often see how certain products or choices are affecting your business in a matter of days or weeks, so you’ll learn a lot quickly.
Make sure your equipment works before buying an existing business – pay someone to test out any equipment you are purchasing and keep in touch with a great maintenance team. Your equipment is critical for making money in this business, so pay extra attention to it at the outset.
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Sarok Shareef | Mad Hat AZ | LinkedIn
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ABOUT SAROK SHAREEF
Sarok Shareef is an IT Sales Executive who has always had an interest in entrepreneurship. He purchased an existing convenience store and learned so much during his first year about operations and team management. About a year later, he took all those lessons and developed a second retail concept leveraging the lessons from his first store to jump-start success with his second location.
