The Dojo of Karate

That’s right… I said milking it.

I got off the phone today with Scott, a really good friend of mine, that owns a karate school down in Lakewood, CO called Denver Karate Academy. He’s basically been a father figure in my life, as well as a great mentor in starting up my business. Gwen, his wife, initially called me to see if I’d be interested in buying their karate mats, since they are going to be moving to a new location. They’d obviously cut me a deal, $5/mat, which is a steal! Buying those things from a whole seller would cost a fortune. Anyways, I decided I’d take them up on the offer.

I then started to talk to Scott, who’s a real big numbers guy. No joke. He doesn’t even write things down, and he’s already calculating your break-even, monthly expenses, gross revenue, etc. Well, he was saying that it’s probably not a bad thing that it’s taking too long to have all the paperwork finalized, Blockbuster approve the space, and State Farm still negotiating the lease. See, I have a 90 day grace period to do my build out for the space - meaning, when the space is delivered, I will have 90 days from that day until my build out has to be finished and The Dojo of Karate can open for business. Well, I was hoping to open ASAP, but Scott pointed out that it’s tough to get students over the summer, which was actually a concern of mine. And, getting permits can be a nightmare too. But he’s saying to take FULL advantage of the 90 days and then when the school opens, I will be almost out of summer and close to “back -to-school” where enrollment can be a bit easier to obtain. Plus, I worked out in my lease that I would only pay 6 months of half rent, after the first months of full rent. I Basically won’t have to pay full rent until January or February 2009. Sooo, I’m going to exercise my leasing rights to it’s fullest. I’ll try to get work done in a reasonable manner, but I am no longer going to be emailing my Leasing Agent to see what else they need from me, and if State Farm has moved out.

I’m starting to feel really comfortable opening the school in late June, ’cause what I can do is 2-3 weeks prior to opening, I can begin to enroll students. If I can get 10-15 “pre-enrolled” that would be a great start, as it gives me bodies in the school to cover any immediate overhead. It’s like they say, “everything happens for a reason”, and this is nothing short of that. Or at least I’m hoping!

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