We often think adding a second location or more square feet is the only way to expand, when, in reality, there are many ideas for expanding a business that add revenue – and boost profits – without adding additional overhead in the process.

Expanding a Business – 5 Ways to Boost Revenue Per Square Foot in Your Business

Price per square foot – it’s one of the biggest costs of doing business. Whether you own or lease, for each square foot you pay for, you must be able to generate a minimum amount of revenue per square foot over and above that number, just to break even. To grow, you must be able to get even more profit out of each square foot of your business.

What does each square foot of your business cost? It’s much more than the price per square foot reflected in your lease agreement. The real cost of doing business, for each square foot, includes each and every expense of your business, including supplies, inventory, insurance, taxes, payroll, etc., divided by the number of square feet in your business.

But you can also calculate revenues or profit for each square foot of your business. In fact, it’s important to be aware of these numbers because for your business to be profitable and generate the money you need to grow, profit per square foot must exist, which means you need to know how much revenue per square foot your business must generate to produce a profit.

If a business can’t produce a profit (money left over after expenses and depreciation), it will have a difficult time growing, because most growth strategies require capital. Capital is where we come in. In particular, when it comes to implementing growth strategies, commercial cash advance financing can provide a business with fast access to the money it needs to grow to the next level.

Essentially, business cash advances provide an organization with a lump sum of working capital which is repaid out of future sales. This is one reason that it’s a great option for businesses that want to use a cash advance to finance inventory, equipment, marketing, or other capital expenses that will lead to increased revenue or open up new streams of revenue.

In fact, one of the best parts about being in the business of cash advance financing is hearing about how our clients use their cash advance to grow. While some do use cash advance financing to add a second business location or incorporate adjacent vacant space because they need additional square footage to grow, others add new lines of revenue without incurring as much additional cost, essentially expanding a business without adding physical space.

Growing a Business – 5 Ways to Expand Without Adding Square Feet

New Equipment

In just about every industry, as technology evolves, not only does newer equipment provide you with the ability to enhance a product or service or produce a completely new one, it often does so on a smaller footprint. When the benefits of increased efficiency, productivity and reduced space requirements add up to new or boosted business revenue, it might be smart to upgrade. This is where expanding a business in it’s current location without adding square feet can help.

Likewise, if you have enough space to add new equipment, you may be able to add whole new lines of revenue to your business in the form of new products or services. If your competitors are providing products or services you aren’t, or you would like to provide customers with items they typically purchase right before (or right after) purchasing yours, this might be an area where adding new equipment could give your business revenues a big boost.

The cost of adding new equipment may be well worth the expense, even if you take on a business financing obligation in the process. You also need to consider what the cost of not adding new equipment could be, especially if your competitors are gaining market share because they can serve clients products or services that your business is not equipped to provide.

New Skills and Training

In service-based industries like salons and spas, dental, medical, etc., education and training can be a vehicle for adding new lines of revenue without adding square footage, and sometimes even without a significant investment in equipment or inventory. As with equipment, assessing advantages of competitors or innovations and trends being pursued by industry leaders can provide insights as to what new services might be most successful with your target markets, which can point you in the right direction when it comes to investing in education and training.

In addition, new service revenues often go hand-in-hand with new product sales, especially when services are enhanced by products customers can use at home or in between appointments.

New Inventory

Periodically changing your inventory is smart business. Phasing out slow-movers can allow you to make ways for new items which can re-engage your customer base or allow you to target an expanded market segment and bring new customers in to your business. Phasing out slow-movers can even spark demand. In fact, limiting customer access to certain products or services to specific periods of time during the year might mean you sell more of those items than you would were they available year-round.

New Blood

Bringing in consultants or hiring new staff can help you expand your business. Hiring new employees strategically for specific skills they bring to the table may give you the ability to launch new products or services (or enhance those you already offer). New hires and consultants also help to bring a fresh perspective. They can point out areas of opportunity and help you see your business through “fresh eyes.” As a result, you may be able to identify new markets for your products or services or eliminate inefficiencies or obsolescing items in order to make room for others.

New Identity

While the underlying values that guide your organization may never change, your brand identity will probably change over time. These changes might be small and reflected in tweaks to the logo, brand taglines, marketing campaigns and colors, or they might be big, and be accompanied by a completely new mission statement, vision for growth, and a new logo – possibly even a new name.

Big changes to brand identity might reflect big changes in leadership; however, they might also be necessitated by big changes in the marketplace or business model. Along with a change to consumer perception, this also provides a business owner with an opportunity to remake the business itself, including tweaking or completely changing its menu of goods or services.

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For most businesses, change is an imperative. If you need working capital for expanding a business, we can help. Get access to money you can use to expand your business (whether that means adding square footage or not) using a merchant cash advance.

Start by requesting a totally free, no-risk quote – a merchant cash advance could provide you with the money you need to grow your business within days: 

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When bills for monthly expenses and payroll are tallied up, even busy restaurants may lack the working capital needed to grow. Here are four ways you can improve restaurant cash flow and access the money you need to grow your business faster.

How to Calculate Restaurant Cash Flow and Finance Restaurant Growth

Your restaurant might be incredibly busy, but that does not necessarily mean that you have the cash flow you need to not only meet expenses but finance restaurant expansion. Find out how to calculate restaurant cash flow, figure out what you need to grow, and discover some ways that you can free up more working capital to make those dreams come true.

Closing out 2018, the restaurant industry just had it’s best year in 3 years, posting its highest sales since 2015. Spurred by increased demand, this might be the perfect time for you to consider ways that your restaurant can generate more revenue, be expanded or be replicated by adding new locations.

Do You Know How to Calculate Restaurant Cash Flow?

At its most basic level, restaurant cash flow equals cash inflows minus cash outflows. When calculating restaurant cash flow, include inflows such as:

  • money (cash, credit or debit card payments) received from customers
  • money received from selling assets
  • money obtained from financing sources (such as a restaurant line of credit or restaurant cash advance)

And outflows, such as:

  • outgoing payments for supplies, payroll, services and other costs of doing business
  • money used to buy assets, make repairs, replace equipment or furnishings, etc.
  • costs of food and beverage ingredients
  • rent, lease or mortgage payments
  • insurance
  • utilities – and so on

As you begin to add up all of the ways that money goes out, it’s easy to understand why even a busy and successful restaurant could have a problem coming up with ‘extra’ working capital needed to fund growth after expenses have been met each month. In a perfect world, a restaurant would have more money coming in from customer sales than needs to go out each month to meet expenses and obligations. These net profits could be invested in capital expenditures, set aside for a rainy day, or placed into a savings or investment fund for use in the future, when growth opportunities arise.

But the world isn’t always perfect! So here are four ways a restaurant can improve cash flow in order to identify working capital needed for growth initiatives – or even just to make ends meet.

4 Ways to Improve Restaurant Cash Flow and Grow More Quickly

Consolidate Buying for Negotiated Discounts

Many suppliers and vendors offer discounts based on volume. If you are able to consolidate purchases so that you can buy in bulk, or buy a variety of items from one or a couple of suppliers, you may have the opportunity to take advantage of discounts, or negotiate with them for a special discount just for your restaurant.

Source Multiple Vendors

Whether it’s the cleaning service that comes when your restaurant is closed or the supplier that brings food and beverage ingredients to your restaurant, it’s wise to source multiple vendors and plan to review contracts on a periodic basis. Low pricing is important, but you should also consider the added value of suppliers that exceed expectations or provide great service, because sometimes these considerations outweigh discounts offered by other companies.

Establish a Restaurant Line of Credit

Thanks to our partnership with Sharp Capital, we do offer restaurant cash advances. The working capital you unlock can provide you with additional purchasing power, the ability to cover unexpected expenses, or give you the ability to take advantage of emerging growth opportunities without having to wait while you are trying to line up financing.

Increase Efficiencies

Many restaurant chains use time-limited offers and loyalty rewards as part of their marketing strategy. These types of marketing tactics can make it easier for you to influence (and predict) customer demand. In turn, you can also improve accuracy for predictions for staffing, inventory, food and drink ingredients, supplies, etc., that will be needed to meet demand at certain times.

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Thinking about a Restaurant Cash Advance or Equipment Financing?

We offer restaurant financing programs that can give you access to working capital that you can use to grow your restaurant or resolve short term restaurant cash flow challenges. There is no cost to apply, no obligation to accept, and we would be happy to work with you to help you determine which financing option would be best for your restaurant.

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Sometimes money is hiding in plain sight, other times you’ll really have to hunt; here are twenty-five places to look when you need to find money to grow your business more quickly.

Find Money to Grow Your Business Hiding in 25 Places

You don’t necessarily have to sell more to find money to grow your business; sometimes it’s a matter of finding the money, not making it. Other times it’s about maximizing use of resources or finding creative ways to work with other businesses.

We’ve come up with a list of more than two dozen ways you might be able to find money to grow your business. These tactics have nothing to do with raising prices or increasing sales, but they can significantly impact your bottom line nonetheless.

25 Places to Find Money to Grow Your Business More Quickly

Salaries and Benefits

Salaries and benefits are often one of if not the biggest costs in a business. Make sure that you’re getting good value for every dollar spent on salaries, benefits and employee perks; where you aren’t getting the most bang for your buck, make a change.  For instance:

  1. Review benefits providers annually (like you would any other vendor) to be sure your employees are getting the best plans at the best prices. If you have a great deal on something, try to lock it in for a longer time period, to preclude automatic annual increases.
  2. Compare the costs, pros and cons of outsourcing both core and non-core business functions (bookkeeping, accounting, taxes, marketing, cleaning, etc.)
  3. Re-evaluate duties and decide whether redistribution of responsibilities could preclude the need to hire or allow you to hire a more junior candidate when filling a new position or replacing a departing employee.
  4. Hire candidates for “added value” skills that you can use now or in the future.
  5. Use staffing agencies to cut employee screening costs and bring in newbies on a temp-to-hire basis to cut down on hiring mistakes or ensure a good fit for hard-to-fill or high turnover positions.

Financing Tools

Sometimes bringing working capital in from the outside makes more sense than depleting reserves or selling off assets to fund growth. When a business idea is likely to increase revenues, additional income could more than offset the loan or cost of financing. Using this as a go-by can help you decide whether it’s better to wait until you have saved up the money to fund a new business idea or pursue business financing; such as:

  1. Bank loans
  2. Specialty financing tools:
    • Business line of credit
    • Equipment lease finance
  3. Business or merchant advance
  4. Invoice Factoring

In addition to business financing tools that provide a lump sum of working capital, if you sell on terms to other companies, you can also use invoice factoring to speed up cash flow. Expediting cash flow by factoring could help you grow more quickly and could help you find savings in other areas of your business, such as taking advantage of quick-pay discounts and reducing overhead related to accounting.

Cutting Overhead

  1. If you rent or lease space, your mortgage or rent payment could be one of your biggest expenses. In a buyer’s market, you might be able to renegotiate the terms of your lease to get a price decrease or lock in a low rate for a long period of time.
  2. If you need additional equipment or furnishings, consider buying used or leasing what you need instead of buying it outright. Preserving working capital means you retain more ready money to grow your business.
  3. Turning the thermostat up or down even a degree or two could make a visible difference in your utilities cost. Likewise, turning off lights in unused areas or setting lights on timers with motion detectors could save you hundreds over the course of a year. Reducing consumption of electricity, water, natural gas, data and other utilities can add up to big savings over time.
  4. Don’t skip the maintenance! Having vents cleaned, screens changed and other maintenance done on time keeps your equipment running at optimum efficiency.
  5. Replace aging equipment with newer, more efficient models can bring significant utility cost savings and might even earn your business tax credits.
  6. Have space you aren’t using? Rent it out!
  7. Reduce the cost of financing by consolidating high interest credit cards and other revolving debt into one account.

Streamline Purchasing

  1. Once upon a time having a petty cash or slush fund for incidentals could save your business in check cashing costs and time spent running to the bank for funds. Today it costs more than it saves, since digital payments are universally accepted and allow you to account for every dollar your business spends. When you need money to grow your business, slush funds should be the first to go.
  2. Stock up and save works. Better forecasting can show you where buying in bulk can save your business money.
  3. Vendor and supplier quick-pay discounts can be sizeable, significantly reducing expenses and the cost of goods sold. Even if a vendor doesn’t advertise a cash or fast-pay discount, they might be open to negotiation.

Cooperative and Co-Working Arrangements

  1. Cooperative marketing has been a tactic small business owners have used over the years. Not only does it reduce expenses for everyone participating, it often amplifies effectiveness as campaigns reach shared contact groups and presentation formats can be bigger, louder or otherwise more impressive.
  2. Cooperative buying arrangements also allow participants to reduce costs by purchasing in larger quantities, eliminating separate shipping charges and gaining other advantages. Likewise, your business could benefit from joining associations and buying clubs that provide members with discounts and special pricing. For instance, joining Amazon Prime costs members $119 per year but gives them free shipping and deal privileges that may more than offset the cost of membership. Business owners can also register for an Amazon Business account that provides free shipping on orders of $49 or more as well as tax-exempt purchasing, special pricing and access to additional business services. Savings like these may also save resources, negating the time you might have otherwise spent looking for lower-priced items, since program savings might exceed potential price differentials.
  3. Like cooperative buying, some of the services your business needs might also be cooperatively outsourced. For instance, if you’re in a retail or manufacturing space adjacent to others, hiring one cleaning service to serve the whole facility might be less expensive than for each business to hire one for themselves.
  4. Renting or buying office space can be formidable, or even a barrier to entry. Opting for co-working space or sharing facilities with other businesses can bring your cost per square foot of space way, way down.
  5. You probably work with vendors that you recommend to other business owners all the time! Inquire to see if any offer (or would be willing to offer) a referral bonus in exchange for sending business their way. Referral bonuses are often based not only on a new customer’s first purchase, but some are even based on a customer’s lifetime value, giving your business a significant return in exchange for your recommendation.
  6. Many online e-commerce sellers (like Amazon) and business services (like web hosting, email marketing, web development, and others) offer affiliate commissions in return for the web traffic you send to them that converts into sales. Like other bonus programs, these dollar amounts might seem small but they can add up over time. Setting this revenue aside for a couple of years could give you a significant amount of working capital for a future project.

No matter how carefully you watch every penny spent in your business or evaluate potential opportunities to increase profits, you’ll probably miss something. We put together this checklist with twenty-five ways you can find money to grow your business either by trimming expenses or boosting revenues – we’d love for you to add your 2 cents with ideas you think we missed in the comments below.