Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Sandwich Shop

Today I want to talk about a sandwich shop. I can't decide if this topic is a departure from the norm, or if it's a glorious return to the good old days. Either way, I'm talking about sandwiches. Take it or leave it.

I've long dreamed of having a sandwich shop. I don't think that it's been one of those conscious dreams, but rather one that I think about every time I make a sandwich. The dream has never been one of "Yeah, I want to do that", but rather one that feels like destiny. It's not something I'm following, it's something that I feel like I'll run into no matter what I do.

Sandwich shop, you are my density.

I believe that a business stands to make a lot of money if their services will make the world a better place. Sure, there's plenty of money to be made by ruining the planet and the people thereon, but I really think that you can make more money by doing good things.

Fast food offers a good service. You can go in there, and get food, nourishment, fast.

But I want to take that a step further. What if I could offer quality nourishment blazing fast for cheap?

My ideal sandwich shop is thus: It's a cart, manned by one or two people. There are only three or four sandwiches on the menu. No customization. You can't not have the mustard. The mustard is here to stay.

But this limited selection means a few good things. One, the sandwich shop doesn't have to stock a bunch of stuff. It's four sandwiches. No exotic breads, no exotic anything. Training employees is super super easy. We don't have to wait for customers to decide anything. We don't have to ask them questions about anything. I want sandwich A, give it to me.

The Sandwich cart aims to be extremely cheap. That means that we need to have very few expenses on our hands. There's a reason that it's a cart and not a restaurant.

What niche does the sandwich cart hope to fill? We hope to fill the utility foods niche. I understand that that's not a popular niche right now. I think though, that it will become more and more popular as time goes on. Imagine this: You're sitting there, working in your office tower, and your lunch break comes along. You've got an hour to go pursue comestibles. Most people want to go get delicious tasting food that will fill them up, and they want to use that whole hour.

Yeah, I understand that. But what about super nerdy people? What about people who are trying to squeeze every single penny out of that budget?

That's where we come in. We offer healthy food. Not pseudo-healthy food like all that stupid health food on the market. We're not scrimping on the calories. Oh no, we've got a manly 800 or 900 calorie meal for you. If you want, we've got a 400 one or so. We offer hearty, manly food. Because no matter what anybody tells you, calories aren't bad. You need those to live. This isn't about not eating anything, or about not eating anything without any nutritional value just because it's only got 18 calories.

There are working men out there. Men laying carpet. And men laying carpet need a manly sandwich. They need loads of meat on giant slabs of whole wheat with tomatoes and all sorts of dietary fat spreads. Because they're not worried about the 2,000 calorie suggestion. That's for people who aren't laying carpet. These men (and women) need that many calories. We offer it fast and cheap. You walk up, say you want the manly sandwich, and it's there super super fast.

What about people in the office, who are sedentary all day? We've got a sandwich for them. Fill you up, super cheap, and you get it in half a second. Imagine the possibilities, if you could run and get a sandwich, and then get back on the clock. Instead of taking an hour lunchbreak, you can take a 15 minute lunchbreak, and go home 45 minutes early. Snap!

Let's be honest here. I don't see any utility food shops around here. Everything is overpriced and slow compared to this. Yes, it is more delicious. The sandwich shop cannot compete with the deliciousness factor. While we plan to offer good, high quality food, we do not aim to be the best tasting sandwich ever. We plan to win over costumers with our speed and price and value.

Yeah, I know, it's a little crazy. But I think the sandwich shop would make the world a better place. It'd let people get back to work if they wanted to. It'd let people go sit in the park for their lunch break instead of at wendy's. It'd offer people real nutritional food. Yeah, it's got lots of calories, probably lots of carbs too. But they're not empty carbs or calories. They're chock full of value and crap you need. It's a hearty sandwich, the good old kind. None of this new "low carb" bread crap. This is whole wheat heavier than a brick bread, you want a piece?

It makes the world a better place. It's not the best money-making scheme in the world. Would it appeal to everybody? Not even close. People right now are driven by taste. Not aiming for that in a food business seems a little insane. But it's what I want to do.

Will I ever do it? Maybe. Like I said, it feels unavoidable. Maybe one day when I've got money, I'll try it out. The best part is, it's super cheap. So even if I crash and burn, I won't be out a lot of money.

Long live the sandwich shop.

1 comment:

Nick said...

Unavoidable. That's a good word, maybe one I need to use more. Or, as the freaky Smith says in The Matrix, "Inevitable." I like that word, too.

My saliva's being produced really quickly. I think you've got something going with this idea.