Update from Spotmojo — Salad Bars, Brewpubs, Korean Food and More

This week, I’d like to provide an update on our effort in Alameda. I’ve been writing these articles on Alameda Patch since late November to help get users' suggestions on Spotmojo, of which I'm a co-founder. The participation here has been great and we're approaching a valid sample.

First, I want to explain Spotmojo’s business model a bit, which will hopefully help you undertstand why we have to do things the way we do. We launched our website late last year and our initial phases' goal was just test out this idea: to see if people really care about the businesses in their neighborhoods and if businesses and commercial property owners find this service useful.

We believe that Spotmojo can be a positive force for the community. It helps the community get the businesses they want, it helps small businesses succeed, and it helps commercial property owners find successful long-term tenants. However, we’re not a nonprofit. We need a business model to make this idea viable and scalable.

Our plan is to eventually charge commercial property owners and businesses for access to reports of the survey results. However, since we’re still testing and refining our service we’re providing our services for free to commercial property owners who help us get the word out about Spotmojo, and this is done primarily by putting our posters in their vacant stores.

Since the reports is a big part of what we’re offering to our clients, we can’t give all the details here on Patch. Otherwise, we’ll have nothing to offer to our clients and we can’t help the community get the businesses they want. I completely understand it would be really interesting to see what the polls are, but I hope you would agree it would be even more interesting to get those businesses to open up in Alameda.

All right! With all that said, let me give you an update on what we’ve been doing.

In random order, here are some of the popular suggestions for Alameda.

• Children’s Activities (Gymboree, Studio Grow, Habitot, etc...)
• Steakhouse
• Salad Bar
• Cafe
• Brewpub (like Pyramid’s)
• Vegetarian Restaurant
• Breakfast & Brunch Restaurant
• Deli (like Saul’s, NY style)
• Korean Restaurant

We haven’t quite achieved a statistically valid sample in Alameda and the suggestion/vote counts for many of the suggestions are so close that some of the lower-ranking suggestions could move significantly. We need about another 100 users to make the top suggestions convincing and even more for the lower-ranking ones.

Salad Bar

Let’s start with salad bars. One thing to be aware of is a major national chain, Fresh Choice, went bankrupt last year. Some of their restaurants have been acquired and rebranded as “California Fresh.” I know many of you do not want a national chain, but the reason why I’m mentioning this is to illustrate some of the challenges in this particular restaurant category.

I then contacted Sweet Tomatoes and was able to speak with someone who handles their real estate assets and marketing. Unfortunately they are not looking to open new restaurants right now. They’re currently remodeling many of their existing restaurants.

I don’t know the specific details on why Fresh Choice went bankrupt, but it was ultimately because they couldn’t pay their debts. Also, many other national restaurant chains downsized in the past few years. These restaurants include Chili’s, Chevy’s, Marie Callender’s, Bennigans, TGI Fridays, and the list goes on. Some of you may be saying “good riddance,” judging by some of your comments about national chains. But some of this could be because of the slow economy, rising energy prices or it could just be simply that people’s preferences have changed.

But don’t worry, we’re still working on finding an operator that can provide a nice salad bar. There are several other operators in the Bay Area that we’ll be reaching out to. Most likely they’ll need several other options in addition to the salad bar to make it viable.

Brewpub

Another type of business we’ve been working to attract to Alameda is a brewpub. Many of you have asked for something similar to a Pyramid’s Brewery, a place that brews their own craft beers, serves good food, and a place to watch the game.

I’ve spoken with two operators that are considering Alameda and both of them already have a brewpub in the Bay Area. They’ve asked not to be named yet since we’re very early in discussions.

One of them is primarily interested in building an additional brewing facility to expand their bottling business and would consider opening a pub next to it in a couple of years. In addition to the brewing facility and pub, they’d also like to build some type of venue for live music. They’re looking at the former Naval base, but unfortunately they haven’t been able to find a suitable space there yet.

To avoid any confusion, this is not Faction Brewing, which is in the process of building their facility at the former Naval Base. From what I’ve gathered Faction will primarily be a brewing facility with a tasting room, but won’t have a pub. Side note: I heard the brewmaster at Faction is one of the best out there and they are expected to make some excellent beers!

I then reached out to a brewer’s trade association who has a database of people in the planning phase of opening a brewery. That introduced us to someone who’s currently the brewmaster at a brewpub in the Bay Area who has been considering opening an additional location. We met and he’s currently talking to his partners about the idea. He also found the survey data you’ve submitted on Spotmojo to be extremely valuable and he thinks it is a fantastic idea. He’s only been to Alameda once and would have probably never even considered it if he didn’t hear about Spotmojo.

To keep expectations in check, one thing to understand is that opening a nice brewpub is a very big investment and will not only take some time to convince the operators to move forward, but also some time to find investors to help with financing. We’re working on this, so please be patient!

Korean Restaurant

Another category we've been working on is a Korean restaurant. I know this one is a bit controversial with some of you, but I think there’s plenty of available space in Alameda so we don't need to compete. I happen to have several close friends that are Korean who then know a lot of other Korean people through church or merchant associations. I've asked them to ask around to see if they know anyone who is looking to open a restaurant. We’re continuing to work on this and will be contacting existing operators as well.

SCORE

Finally, I met with several mentors at SCORE. SCORE is a nonprofit association that provides free mentoring to people who are either about to start or currently operating a business. Most of their clients are in the planning phase and one of the things they help them with is finding a location. The mentors at SCORE love the idea of Spotmojo. They do think we need more users to make it more convincing, but they’ve already started to refer some of their clients. I gave them a list of the top suggestions in Alameda so they are now on the lookout as well.

Conclusion

I just wanted to provide you an update on what we’ve been doing with your suggestions on Spotmojo. We’re working feverishly on attracting the businesses you want to Alameda.  If you have friends in or near Alameda, please have them make suggestions on Spotmojo. Regardless of what they suggest, the increased user count will make all the suggestions more convincing as it makes it a more valid sample.

As always, feel free to contact me if you have any questions.

Links

I've provided some links to various open spots on Spotmojo that should cover the various parts of Alameda:

PV Square, near Marketplace: http://www.spotmojo.com/openspot/1700park/

Park & Central: http://www.spotmojo.com/openspot/1400park/

South Shore Center: http://www.spotmojo.com/openspot/southshore/

Harbor Bay Shopping Center: http://www.spotmojo.com/openspot/harborbay/

Marina Village Shopping Center: http://www.spotmojo.com/openspot/marina/