Dream LHBS

Hey All, looking for some help from all the brewers on HBT...

I am doing research into opening a LHBS, and I just wanted some input from the "uses" on what they want to see, what they usually buy locally, and in there are any LHBS owners/ operators what doesn't work.

I know the basics, hops, chems, beer kits etc., I'm just looking for info on the speciality stuff that people would buy local to save paying shipping etc.

Thanks in advance for all the help!

Some other things I've bought at my lhbs: Growlers, tubing, plumbing, airlocks, beer glasses, bottles.

Enough space to look and walk around, cramped over packed show rooms suck.
Grain
Kits, good local kits
Brew gear; books, posters, shirts, ect.
Equipment on display

Friendly, knowledgeable staff

Bulk grain and hops would be the top of my list. I have been to some brew shops that don't do bulk...they want you to pay 1.80 lb for 2 row!! Also it is EXTREMELY important to have knowledgeable staff....it bugs me when I know more than they do about brewing and they are getting paid for their knowledge.

Fresh yeast, bulk grains, diverse supply of specialty grains, good supply of hops. I like my LHBS but hate how many times I've been in there for a specific hop variety or some specialty grain and they have been out of it.

Probably the best feature at my LHBS is they let you buy a bag of grain at the bulk price and then just "debit" the weight of grain you pick up each time you come in and get your ingredients. Very cool for base malts -- you can take all the advantages of bulk buying, and don't have to worry about storage or freshness.

Very good input so far, keep it coming please! Also what sizes of tubing are most popular, I assume 1/4, 5/16, and maybe 3/8"?

3/8 and 1/4 definitely. Ditto on the beer glasses comment, I can't find any good ones without buying online.
Mostly you need to be friendly and helpful without being a know-it-all. From what I've read and experienced the single most important piece to running an in-store (as opposed to internet order) specialty shop (like a LHBS) is being friendly so people want to come back.
Don't worry about having absolutely everything; customers won't begrudge you for not having their 23/32" glass-lined rubbed bronze keg lines.

Silicone tubing in 1/2 and 3/8.
Ball and pin lock keg parts.
SS hardware; couplers, valves, Tees, QD's
Kent QD's; they are great and cheap!
The ability to special order anything you don't carry in stock
Staff that listens and helps, rather than question and ridicule.
Plenty of room, think about enough room to maybe do onsite classes in basic and advanced brewing.

My LHBS sells 2-row for $7.50/5lbs. I can get it online, even with shipping, for significantly less. Specialty grains, hops and yeast are also significantly cheaper online. As an example, dry yeast at my LHBS is $5.00 but I can order it for roughly $3.00. Since I'm ordering ingredients anyway, I tend to simply add any other little things I need to my order and avoid the LHBS for everything but emergency items.

I don't know if the economics make sense, but if I was planning a LHBS I would try to price basic ingredients as competitively as possible. If my LHBS had good prices on the basics I would probably visit them once or twice a month. While I was picking up my grains I might be tempted by some cool glassware or other (more profitable) items.

Now whether you can keep the lights on with that sort of scheme I have no idea.

Organization is a major concern. There should be a logical grouping of things in your showroom to make things easy to find. While I love to see a place with one of everything on display, this can be a financial challenge. A way around this, which I do not see at my LHBSs, is to have catalogs available for the customers (and employees) to browse. When I worked the parts counter at a motorcycle shop, this was a major help to us to always stay on top of new products, locate items that a customer may not know the name of, and let the customers pick out and purchase items that we never would have dreamed of stocking.

If you have an online store, apply the same organization as you would your physical store. Group the items in a logical fashion, keep them up to date, and delete any items that are discontinued or no longer available to you.

Your primary reason for existing - ingredients - is a major concern. Be certain that you are always on top of your inventory so you know when to reorder and hopefully avoid selling out of certain ingredients. If you find that you run out of hop A more often than hop B, take this into consideration and order accordingly. One of my local LHBSs is often substituting ingredients for the customer, sometimes without telling them until they've arrived to pick up their phoned-in order. I'm no expert brewer, so I do not know the extent of when it is or is not acceptable to substitute, but I would imagine that highly competitive homebrewers probably want the specific ingredients they've asked for.
Once again, if you run an online store - keep it up to date with your inventory. Once you're out of something, disable it until you replenish it.

Good luck!

I go to my LHBS primarily to buy sacks of grain and yeast. While I'm there I look around and buy other things I need if they catch my eye.

If I could order bulk hops from my LHBS for a reasonable price I might do it, but I definitely don't spend $2.50/oz on hops there unless I really only need 1-2 oz of a certain hop and haven't planned far enough ahead to order it online (not often).

Theshorey said:

Hey All, looking for some help from all the brewers on HBT...

I am doing research into opening a LHBS, and I just wanted some input from the "uses" on what they want to see, what they usually buy locally, and in there are any LHBS owners/ operators what doesn't work.

I know the basics, hops, chems, beer kits etc., I'm just looking for info on the speciality stuff that people would buy local to save paying shipping etc.

Thanks in advance for all the help!

Click to expand...

Tangibles have already been listed. My suggestion would be to provide the intangibles. Unless you live in an area void of a HBS, I would suggest finding a way to make your shop standout. Try organizing events to bring local brew clubs together at your shop. See if you can get local breweries to sponsor a "Meet the brewer" night. Advertise a free class/workshop once a week. This only helps if you or your employees are knowledgable. Besides the inventory, marketing will be your next major investment.

Of the shops in my area, each one has an alternate type business running out of the same building. One hydroponics/HBS, mini-mart/HBS, and several brewery/HBS. Don't know if an HBS could sustain itself and provide you with personal income. I hope the research is a precursor to writing a business plan.

While there are many online sources for brew stuff, I like the business model adopted by one of the fishing/camping stores near here. They have a fully stocked and varied brick-and-mortar store, but also large enough space in the back that they can store a lot of overstock. Why the overstock? Partly to save by buying in volume, but partly because they've also added an online store, and it's not uncommon for them to ship 100-125 items per day. That's a big deal when foot traffic is down, and another way to vary the revenue stream.

It's definitely a bigger investment to set up a business with dual citizenship, so to speak. Added costs in inventory, shipping supplies and Web site. So many small business get started too undercapitalized to succeed. So there's that to consider. But no reason it couldn't work for a brew store.

Friendly, knowledgeable staff is the most important thing. Everyone who works there must be courteous to customers and able to offer advice or be able to troubleshoot a problem the customer is having with one of their beers. You will always be at a price disadvantage to the online retailers, your only advantage is face-to-face interaction with your customers, so you have to make that count. Maddad's suggestions of events is a good one, classes and demonstrations are something the online retailers can't do, so that is a good way to differentiate your shop.

Very good info! I'm working on the bulk ingredients side of things too, particularly trying to find local (to Maine at least) sources for things like hops, grain, honey, etc. Grapes are hard because the season is so short, but I like the thought of being able to mail order speciality items... I have thought some about the online option, but if we do it'll probably just be a simple web site with a way for customers to place e-mail orders and then either pickup at the store or have shipped in-state that way I'm not trying to go head-to-head with the larger online retailers.

The lessons would be fun, but there are already two locations about 45 minutes away that have recently opened and are doing lessons, my advantage is that I would be specializing in local and possibly bulk products as well as some of the harder to find speciality grains etc.

I wouldn't poo poo offering local lessons. With the price of gas a 90 mile round trip is a fair investment in fuel expense for a class.

All grain brewing is sexy and all but introducing people to some of the less expensive fermented beverages would be a great way to get people into the hobby. I'm thinking ciders, meads, skeeter pees etc etc. These can be made with a minimal investment in equipment and ingredients yet it gets people into your store.

Learning that they can make tasty adult beverages for a buck or 2 per bottle (wine bottle) and have fun doing it is enlightening.

The input has been very helpful, and now I'm starting to get a better handle on what home brewers are looking for... always dangerous, but I'm gonna ask for opinions on beer kits, are the Mid-west kits worth the cost, or is it just easier to find a good recipe and buy everything seperate? I only ask about the mid-west ones because they will sell wholesale to retailers, and they seam to have a better selection of kits that crosby & baker...

I think providing kits (from your bulk ingredients) of your own recipes with your logo on them would cement your credibility as a brewer and add something that the customers can't get by buying online.

So if a location had a large variety of hops, malts, grains, etc available to buy in measured amounts (1 oz incriments for hops, .25 lb incriments for grains & DME) approx how much would you guys be ordering in a month... or if you know about what you spend at the LHBS now that you work too...

BTW - I just wanted to say thank you to everyone for the input, makes writing a business plan and working up an estimated budget/ startup cost so much easier!
One of the line items on my budget is a lifetime membership to HBT!

I brew a 5 gallon partial grain batch once a month or so, which is a lot less than most people. I buy all my ingredients from my LHBS and take the time while weighing stuff out to shoot the breeze, taste his beer, share mine etc. It works out to be about 5 lbs grain, 3 lbs dry malt extract, couple oz hops and 1 pack (dry or wet) of yeast. Once in a while I restock on things like whirlfloc, yeast nutrient, bottling sugar, caps, etc. And a little more rarely I buy a new piece of gear. I probably average about 30-35 bucks a month.

I should also add, this LHBS is very much a side business for the guy. He has a day job and basically only runs it on weekends, and yes, it's out of his garage. Clean, well organized, website and business cards, but it's his garage.

Have free or super cheap classes on homebrew basics. You'll be suprised what people will buy when they get something (info) for free.

Hardware for kegs and all grain setups i.e. ball lock valves, brewmometers, sight glasses, false bottoms, sparge arms, quick disconnects and replacement poppets and o rings.
Knowledgeable staff, knowledgeable staff, knowledgeable staff.
Good luck and have fun

I'd say bulk base grains for sub $50 per sack for the basic stuff like Briess, and anything under $70 for a sack of Euro grain is reasonable. While not always practical, having a wide selection of specialty grains is an awesome thing for a LHBS to carry in stock. Also, something rather new my LHBS has started, a big chalkboard of all the hop varieties they carry, and next to each breed a demarcation if they have it in stock in pellet, leaf, or not at all. Also, a wide variety of yeast strains, relatively fresh if possible.

That's what I primarily use my LHBS for, and I'd have to say I'm extremely happy with them.

Location: I live in the middle of nowhere, and as if it wasn't annoying enough to have to go to the next town over, it was in a really bad location.

Hours: The store I mentioned previously was really bad and went bankrupt, but it had really good hours. Another store is way better on all fronts - except the hours. Open three days a week, for an hour or two per day.

Storage: This I can't stress enough. The bad LHSB stored dry yeast in a basket, right next to a hot lightbulb. They were all mixed in that basket, too. It was generally hard to find anything in that store. No fridge for the hops, either. One 1kg bag of uncrushed base malt... no milling provided...

Ingredients: This is hard, you gotta cater to a lot of different needs.

Equipment: Neither of the stores sold any brewpots, mostly fermentation stuff, mills, capping. No kegging stuff either, and here that'd be a real plus since the internet stores are over charging for that.

Get a good mill, some stores provide substandard milling which hurts the brewers. They get lower efficiency, and have to buy more grain - that's the plan anyway. I'd rather just take my business elswhere.

Try and get on a good foot with a brew club, if you have the space let them use it for meetings. Classes, as someone mentioned, is a good idea. Others might be doing that too, but yours can be better.

And also mentioned by someone else, your own brand of AG kits. Although personally I'm not interested in them in general, I'd might pick 'em up anyway if I'm already there

And it's great for those who can't, or won't, make their own recipes. In the case of my father - both.

Fresh yeast and a good selection of it. Or at least the ability, or want, to get me the yeast I'm looking for. I hate when I'm looking for, say 3711, and the LHBS owner tells me that 3787, is 'basically the same thing'.