Albemarle Street at the heart of Mayfair (The Royal Institution) This is a short feature on how to select a good retail site. I am using my experience with a client who wanted to set up a high end Art Gallery in Mayfair (London). These Art Galleries are centred around Cork Street and New Bond [...]
Albemarle Street at the heart of Mayfair (The Royal Institution)
This is a short feature on how to select a good retail site. I am using my experience with a client who wanted to set up a high end Art Gallery in Mayfair (London). These Art Galleries are centred around Cork Street and New Bond Street. The other streets being Albemarle Street, Savile Row, Mount Street, Clifford Street and Old Burlington Street.
The client said that he had found an ideal property on Old Burlington Street where the rent fitted his budget. He had worked out a business plan, suppliers, monies for rent, staff and refitting of the property. All he wanted was my approval on the selected property, do my magic with feng shui and everything would be work to plan to get the projected sales. It would be Hunky Dory (a British slang) on his part! The rent was extremely reasonable for that area and the unit did not need any money to be spent on the decor. It was ready to use.
I visited the site and asked for the “history of the site”. How many recent tenants have there been? The estate agent rattled out the history of previous tenants and it clicked. It was a nightmare site. Tenants would come in with the best of intentions, refurbish the unit as their version of a high end gallery, get the stock in and waited for business to come. Wait they did. They waited and waited for the customers which did not come. The tenants moved out but after an heavy expenditure of time and money; let alone a loss of confidence. Then, there is the additional expenditure of getting the rent paid after moving out.
He then said to me, I thought with feng shui, you could turn a site with a history of poor business to one with good business. Yes I can do it only if there is plenty of energy going down the street. There is no energy flowing on this street. There are no shops, just offices and a multi-level car park. This speaks volumes for the level of business on this street. That is why you can get the unit for an amazingly low rent in Mayfair. It has a string of failures behind it.
We then toured the other streets with the art galleries. The vacant sites were either too expensive or needed a refurbishment which was way above his budget.
When we parted, he was happy that he knew that his project, as envisaged, would not work. He did not lose any money. The time he lost was in the planning of the project. I would recommend this approach to everybody looking for retail premises. Discuss the project with me first before paying any monies. I certainly do not like going to failing shop and being asked to improve it. In 99% of the time, there is no energy getting to the main door and there is nothing that can be done.
Secondly, he began to recognise the word “bargain” or “below market value” in property. We understand buying consumer goods at a discount. Consumer goods depreciate or have very little re-sale value. There is a serious market in property. A property that is to be sold needs a buyer paying the asking price or better. A property for rent needs to be occupied with a tenant paying the asking rent. An unoccupied property is a serious liability. It is not doing anybody any favours.
When a property that is being sold at a discount, there must be a reason for the discount. More often than not, they have hit a problem – cannot sell at the initial asking price, owner got into financial problems etc. In more cases than not, the feng shui of the property is poor. Therefore, when you are purchasing the discounted property, you are inheriting the associated problems of the property as well.
· If it was hard to rent out; you will also find it hard to rent out as well.
· If it is hard to sell, you will also find it hard to sell as well,
· If it is doing poor business because of location, it will also do poor business as well.
I prefer to be called in at the planning stage so I can comment on the various shortlisted properties.
1. Identify potential locations that would work very well or bea successful location for business
2. Identify property in secondary sites but will be a successful location
3. Identify property that are currently poorly performing but can be altered to be a successful location.
This way, the client minimises the risk of time and money and maximise the upside potential of the project.
Dr Michael Oon
Silicon Valley has always been associated with success. This success has, in most cases been attributed to the buildings or corporations.Paul Saffo reveals the true secret of the success of Silicon Valley.
“The absolute secret to Silicon Valley’s Success is Failure.
This place re-invents itself because we know how to fail in the right way.
Silicon Valley was not built on the Spires of earlier successes but on the rumble of earlier failures.
The companies that grew large and then collapsed in a spectacular way.
A bunch of little start-ups colonised their old offices. You see this again and again and again in Silicon Valley.
This place works because we know how to fail.”
BBC Radio 4
In Business, Not just Silicon
16th May 2010. 9:30pm
Economist John Kay has just published a book ‘Obliquity: Why our goals are best achieved indirectly where he makes observations that ” the most profitable companies are not the most profit-oriented” He goes through the episode where the pharmaceutical giant Merck (original ethos – “We try never to forget that medicine is for the people. [...]
Economist John Kay has just published a book ‘Obliquity: Why our goals are best achieved indirectly where he makes observations that ” the most profitable companies are not the most profit-oriented”
He goes through the episode where the pharmaceutical giant Merck (original ethos – “We try never to forget that medicine is for the people. It is not for the profits. The profits follow, and if we have remembered that, they have never failed to appear”) changed their ethos to become industry “top-tier growth company” in the 1990s. It is now an “has-been” after getting stuck with flawed products.
“Today, the pharmaceutical company which has created most value for its shareholders is Johnson & Johnson, whose oblique credo was set out in 1943 by Robert Johnson, a scion of the founding family and company chairman for 30 years. “We believe our first responsibility is to the doctors, nurses and patients, to mothers and fathers and all others who use our products and services”, it begins. The credo ends, many lines later, “when we operate according to these principles, the stockholders should realise a fair return”. Events seem to have proved Robert Johnson right.”
John Kay then goes through the stories of Sam Walton (of Wal Mart), Bill Gates (Microsoft), David Beckham (with his “curved” free kicks) and many more. He also delves into the story of the most profit-oriented corporations in the history of the world – Bear Sterns “Let’s make nothing but money.” and Lehman Brothers who disappeared in the 2008 financial debacle.
Of recent experience, has been the Toyota car recall. This is the world largest car recall and currently, there are uncertainties of the true cause of the technical issues. Akio Toyoda (Toyota President) has acknowledged that the company grew too fast – in 2002, with 10% of the world car market, a decision was made to become the largest motor manufacturer with the aim of 15% of the market (and presumably, increase profitability as well). Toyota had built its reputation on producing solid and reliable cars. This reputation has now been called to question with these problems.
As a child, I was encouraged to go for my passion and not for the money. The quality of life is far more important. Also, there was the story which I will never forget.
“If you chase the money, money behaves like a dog. You chase it, it will run faster than you as it has 4 legs. But, when you are in demand, money will be chasing you; just like a dog chasing you”.
The point of this blog?
The Government strategy started in the 1980s of supporting the Service industries, particularly financial services, has come to an end with the 2008 financial debacle. A new strategy has to be started by the new government of whatever hue.
As I see it, as a trend, emphasis will move away from the financial services (shuffling of money around) to the creation of products of value – like new technology, things that are beneficial to people’s lives. There was an indication from the budget of a one-off £270m funding for 2010-2011 that will support subjects including science, technology and maths in universities in England from September. Also, there has been a greater number of programmes on the BBC on Science and Technology since 2009.
Have I seen the light or living in cloud cuckoo land?
Dr Michael Oon
