Over the years, surveys have suggested that up to 90% of Americans watch sports on at least a semi-regular basis. From football and basketball to baseball and hockey, many people just can’t get enough sports in their life.
For this reason, it might be a smart idea for you to open up a sports-themed restaurant in your city or town. When opening a restaurant, you should always try to come up with some kind of a theme for it. And sports is a fantastic theme for any restaurant since it’ll come with a big built-in audience.
Before you think about starting a business by trying to get a sports-themed restaurant off the ground, though, you should make sure that you’re ready to take the right approach to it. Otherwise, your sports-themed restaurant might not get as much traction as you would like. It’ll make you regret not planning a business out better.
Here are the steps you should take when jumpstarting a sports-themed restaurant and building it from the ground up.
Start by Seeing Which Other Sports-Themed Restaurants Exist in Your Area
When you first come up with the idea to try and open up a sports-themed restaurant, you might be tempted to dive headfirst into starting a business. But prior to doing this, you should do your research on the competition that already exists in your area.
Google “sports-themed restaurants near me” and see how many different options pop up. You might be surprised to see just how many sports-themed restaurants there are out there at the moment.
There are thousands of sports bars scattered throughout the country at this time. As a result, there are bound to be at least a few of them in your area.
This doesn’t mean that you can’t necessarily open up your own sports-themed restaurant and compete with them. But you will want to check out what they’re bringing to the table in an effort to set your establishment apart.
Come Up With a Business Plan for Your Sports-Themed Restaurant
Once you do your homework on the other sports-themed restaurants in your area, you should start planning a business in an official capacity. This is going to involve you creating a business plan for your sports-themed restaurant.
What should your business plan include? Well, it should be very comprehensive from beginning to end. And it should have things like this in it:
- A mission statement for your sports-themed restaurant
- An overview of the competition that your sports-themed restaurant will face
- A name for your sports-themed restaurant
- A marketing agenda for your sports-themed restaurant
- A projection for the sales figures for your sports-themed restaurant
The more information that you’re able to cram into your sports-themed restaurant’s business plan, the better off you’ll be. It’ll show others how serious you are about opening a restaurant, and it’ll also increase your chances of being able to secure a business loan if you need one.
Figure Out How You’re Going to Fund Your Sports-Themed Restaurant
Opening a restaurant isnot going to be cheap. You’re going to be looking at paying about $375,000 on average to do it. And in some instances, you could end up spending well over $1 million to bring the ideas that you have for your sports-themed restaurant to life.
If you’ve got millions of dollars stashed away in your savings account, great! You won’t have to worry about how you’re going to get your hands on the money you’ll need to start your business.
But if you’re not rich beyond your wildest dreams, you’re most likely going to have to take out a business loan to pay for your sports-themed restaurant. This will require you to reach out to different lenders to see if they can help you.
Each of these lenders will want to see a copy of your business plan before they even think about giving you a business loan. It’s a big part of the reason why it’s so important to put together a great business plan from the start.
Search for the Perfect Location for Your Sports-Themed Restaurant
After you’re able to work out the financial aspect of opening a restaurant, you can begin to look for a location for it. This is arguably going to be the most important thing that you’ll do when starting a business in the restaurant industry.
If you choose the wrong location for your sports-themed restaurant, you might doom it from the start. It’s why you should look high and low for a location that is going to bring in big crowds from the second that you start running your restaurant.
Ideally, you should search for a location for your sports-themed restaurant that is:
- Easy to get to
- Surrounded by plenty of parking options
- Near any major highways in your area
- Away from other sports-themed restaurants and bars
Try not to be in a huge hurry to pick out a location for your sports-themed restaurant. You should take your time while you’re searching for a location and continue your search until you’ve found a spot that you feel good about.
Design the Interior of Your Sports-Themed Restaurant
Finding a location is going to prove to be a big hurdle when you’re on the hunt for a place for your sports-themed restaurant. So you should give yourself an opportunity to take a deep breath once you have a location locked down.
Don’t sit around twiddling your thumbs for too long, though! You have a sports-themed restaurant that you’re going to need to design so that you can start to put it all together.
In a perfect world, you’re going to want to try to make your sports-themed restaurant feel very open. This will give your customers a chance to watch the TVs that you’ll hang in your restaurant (more on them in a few moments!) from almost any angle.
There shouldn’t be a bad seat in the house in your sports-themed restaurant. It should almost make people feel like they’re hanging out at a sporting event when they’re sitting in your sports bar.
Invest in the Best Furniture for Your Sports-Themed Restaurant
The average NFL game lasts for more than 3 hours. The average NBA and college basketball games last for between 2 and 3 hours. And the average MLB game lasts for more than 3 hours as well.
What does this all mean to you? It means that a lot of the customers at your sports-themed restaurant are going to do an awful lot of sitting while they’re hanging out at your new spot.
Because of this, you’ll want to invest in the very best furniture for it. From restaurant chairs to restaurant tables, you should pick out furniture for your sports-themed restaurant that will keep your customers comfortable while they’re watching games.
As long as you have comfy furniture for your customers, you won’t have to worry about them not sticking around for entire games. They’ll stay in one spot for at least one game, and on some days, they might even set up shop for multiple games at a time thanks to the furniture that you bought for your restaurant.
Hang Up Lots of Sports Memorabilia in Your Sports-Themed Restaurant
From the moment that people walk into your restaurant, there should be no escaping the fact that it’s a sports-themed restaurant. Each and every item that you hang up on the walls should have some connection to sports.
You should consider hanging up things like:
- Old-school sports posters
- Signed sports jerseys
- Sports scoreboards
- Pennants and pom-poms
- Sports gear
You might even want to try to create a connection with your local community by calling around to the local high schools and colleges to see if they would be willing to donate some gear to your new sports-themed restaurant. You can hang it up to show your support for these educational institutions.
Find Places to Put Plenty of TVs in Your Sports-Themed Restaurant
You can hang up all the sports memorabilia that you want on the walls of your sports-themed restaurant. But let’s be honest: If you don’t find places to put plenty of TVs up, you’re not going to be able to bring in many customers.
On a Sunday afternoon, there will sometimes be ten or more NFL games on at one time. During March Madness, there will be dozens of games played within a matter of just a few hours.
Your job is going to be to show as many sporting events as you possibly can on the TVs that you put up throughout your sports-themed restaurant. This is going to call for you to invest in tons of high-definition TVs that will be able to keep up with all the action that’s going on in the sports world on any given day.
It’s also going to call for you to update your TVs over time accordingly. You’ll need to continue to wow your customers with gorgeous TVs that allow them to watch all the big games.
Create an Amazing Food and Drink Menu for Your Sports-Themed Restaurant
People are going to want to do more than just watch sports when they’re at your sports-themed restaurant. And you’re obviously going to want them to do more than just watch sports, too.
In addition to enjoying all the big games, your customers are also going to eat and drink quite a bit while they’re in your restaurant. So you’re going to need to supply them with an amazing food and drink menu that they can order from early and often.
You’re probably going to want to stay away from offering too many high-end steak and lobster dishes. Instead, you should serve traditional pub fare like hamburgers, wings, pizzas, etc. This is usually going to be what people will want to eat while they watch sports.
You should also have plenty of drinks for people to choose from. Water, soda, and juice are all no-brainers. But since you’re opening a sports-themed restaurant, you’ll also need to have a large selection of beers that people can drink. You should try to keep as many of these beers on tap as you can.
Many sports-themed restaurant owners focus so much on delivering a superior sports-watching experience to their customers that they lose sight of their menu. Try not to do this as it could very well be your restaurant’s food and drinks that ultimately make or break it.
Learn the Most Effective Ways to Market Your Sports-Themed Restaurant
You can set up the best sports-themed restaurant in the world. But if you don’t know the first thing about marketing a restaurant, you’ll struggle to bring people through your front door.
It’s why you should come out swinging when it comes to marketing your sports-themed restaurant from the beginning. You should market your restaurant by:
- Running advertisements on your local TV and radio stations
- Creating social media accounts and connecting with people in your community
- Offering crazy food and drink specials
- Paying professional athletes to make appearances
- Holding sports-related giveaways (jerseys, tickets, etc.)
By marketing your sports-themed restaurant, you’ll generate some much-needed interest in it and get people to give you a chance. That would provide you with an opportunity to put your best foot forward and show what you’re made out of.
Begin Trying to Open a Sports-Themed Restaurant Today
Opening a sports-themed restaurant might sound like a lot of fun. But it’s actually going to be way more work than you might anticipate.
As you’ve seen here, there are so many steps that you’ll need to take to turn your dreams for a sports-themed restaurant into a reality. But by making your way through these steps, you should slowly see some progress. It’ll allow you to build a sports-themed restaurant that you’re proud of in the end.
Want to get some additional tips on starting a business from scratch? Take a look at some of the other articles that we’ve posted on our blog to find them!
