Pop up shops - any advice?

Dubltrbl

Looking to do a pop up shop based in Dublin City Centre. Anyone have any experience/useful tips?

In particular interested to hear any experience with Short Term Leases and rates, any hidden costs that might be incurred?

jimmii

How long are you planning on going in for? Some Landlords can be very accommodating of pop-ups there was someone on before Christmas who managed to get a unit for free for 3 weeks! Try show them that having a successful short term occupant is going to make the unit more appealing to long term occupents. Nothing puts off a potential occupant than a long term unlet unit. Other costs to consider would be electricity, waste, IMRO/PPI on top of the obvious fittings and fixtures etc try and negotiate a price with the Landlord that just includes everything (rent, rates, utlities etc) makes it a lot easier on both parties.

Dubltrbl

Thanks jimii some very sound advice.

I am hoping for a 3 month lease (I guess it's a long enough Pop Up!)

jimmii

Dubltrbl wrote: »

Thanks jimii some very sound advice.

I am hoping for a 3 month lease (I guess it's a long enough Pop Up!)

Where abouts are you looking? I have a shop in the City Centre too. Are you using this a test before a full launch or do you just want to do it for 3 months to clear some stuff?

Dubltrbl

City Centre would be ideal. Open to suggestions really on locations.

The initial idea would be 3 months (as I know it would work over the seasonal period) with a review at the end to see if the potential is there for extending it.

Please feel to Private Message me if you think you may have something suitable?

jimmii

Outside of the obvious (and expensive spots) the best location is going to depend on what you are selling. The more niche what you are offering is the more out of the way you can be. We're a little off the beaten track but because our main product is pretty niche people are willing to walk that little bit further to get to us. Because you are only opening for a short while I would try get a unit next to or near somewhere that I think my target market is already going to be visiting as you don't really have time to build a customer base you have to just jump in the middle of one!

Cianos

We started as a pop up shop in Dun Laoghaire, feel free to post any questions here and I'll answer them!

You might want to give a hint at what type of business it'll be as well.

Dabs

Hi there,

Sorry to piggy back on this but we're looking to do a pop up shop too and would love any advice! Hoping to do a 2 week one in late September and then a month long one leading up to Christmas (the second ideally happening in the premises that we will then take on permanently from about Feb 2015).

Cianos I see you did one in Dun Laoghaire and it looks like the council there are really proactive about them, haven't come across any such proactiveness from the DCC! Although I'd be delighted if I'm wrong. we're going to be doing an interiors and lifestyle shop and we want to be around the Drury St/South William St area. From what I've heard from friends who have done pop ups or tried to, the estate agents aren't interested in talking about pop ups so you have to go direct to landlords but it's hard finding out who the landlords are.........typical Catch 22 situation. We know that Powerscourt are quite open to pop ups but we want one of the empty units around there that has the shopfront on the street so it wouldn't really work.

Any advice about how we'd go about talking to landlords or any tips for getting into properties would be really helpful. Thanks very much in advance.

Cianos

Dabs wrote: »

Hi there,

Sorry to piggy back on this but we're looking to do a pop up shop too and would love any advice! Hoping to do a 2 week one in late September and then a month long one leading up to Christmas (the second ideally happening in the premises that we will then take on permanently from about Feb 2015).

Cianos I see you did one in Dun Laoghaire and it looks like the council there are really proactive about them, haven't come across any such proactiveness from the DCC! Although I'd be delighted if I'm wrong. we're going to be doing an interiors and lifestyle shop and we want to be around the Drury St/South William St area. From what I've heard from friends who have done pop ups or tried to, the estate agents aren't interested in talking about pop ups so you have to go direct to landlords but it's hard finding out who the landlords are.........typical Catch 22 situation. We know that Powerscourt are quite open to pop ups but we want one of the empty units around there that has the shopfront on the street so it wouldn't really work.

Any advice about how we'd go about talking to landlords or any tips for getting into properties would be really helpful. Thanks very much in advance.

I think the general consensus at the moment is that things are turning around a bit, so you'd want to act quickly as landlords might be less interested now in accommodating pop ups than they would have been before.

You might be best off just approaching a landlord and telling them that you'll be promoting it as a pop up and if things go well you'll happily take on a short lease. They might be attracted to this as it gives them more options in a few months to reassess their prices after having seen whether the market does pick up a lot.

Of course you could do what we did, use Dun Laoghaire as a testing ground and gauge whether your concept has enough potential to move further. We found it a great way to learn the strengths and weaknesses of what we were doing and it was a very low risk way of gaining that experience.

Dabs

Thanks, that's good advice, I'll have a think about testing things out in Dun Laoghaire as you say. I'd definitely go straight to approaching landlords but the problem I'm having is finding them! Is there any central database of commerical landlords in Ireland? Seems impossible to find out who owns commercial properties unless I'm missing something.

Cianos

Dabs wrote: »

Thanks, that's good advice, I'll have a think about testing things out in Dun Laoghaire as you say. I'd definitely go straight to approaching landlords but the problem I'm having is finding them! Is there any central database of commerical landlords in Ireland? Seems impossible to find out who owns commercial properties unless I'm missing something.

They often own the entire building. If there are apartments or offices upstairs you could ring in and ask them could they give you the LL's number.

Dabs

Great idea, thanks very much.