Relocating - advice needed

[Luddite]

Hi. As some of you may know, my business is both a website and 'bricks & mortar' shop. We close our current shop in about 2 weeks time, and due to long delays (we were supposed to have opened new shop in June), our new shop will not open until mid November. However, we have negotiated a temporary shop to trade from from Early October throught til January (2 shops over Christmas - not sure if thats good or bad at the moment!).

Anyway, my reason for posting is that the website has to be consistent during this transition. In my head, my plan was to go and buy a laptop and run it from there until we are fully relocated. However, i'm abit troubled by the security aspects of this. Maybe we should set up the PC at home and run the website from there - but then we have logistical problems in that all the stock/packaging materials/staff are at a different location.

I'd be grateful for any advice on this.

Cheers - Nick

[pinbrook]

I'd probably go for the PC at home, print off your packing lists/invoices and go to the stock location with these.

[jont]

Run the PC from home (ie a central location) but make sure you have copies of any recent orders available (on paper) in case of delivery queries, phone calls etc so you can answer them there-and-then.

2 shops over Christmas :eek:

[Luddite]

I read somewhere once that people only ask advice when they know what they want to do, but want to hear someone else say it too. How right they were! Thanks - I'll be doing as you both suggest.

2 shops over Christmas :eek:
3 shops if you include the website! Lets hope the hassle converts into ££.

Nick

[pinbrook]

3 shops if you include the website! Lets hope the hassle converts into ££.

be sure to keep the actual processing to the PC at home, but feel free to take a snapshot for reference only to the shops if you think you will want to be able to refer to order detail for phone calls etcetc.

[jont]

I read somewhere once that people only ask advice when they know what they want to do, but want to hear someone else say it too

I think "hear someone else say it too" should be "to blame someone else when it goes pear-shaped" :D

[buspassjohn]

Hi Nick,
you are either extremely brave or reckless to open a new shop in November, as you persevere with Actinic I guess it must be brave.
Personally I would never try running the website from a different location to the stock and despatch, there is no way you will keep up with the flow in & out of stock in the xmas bulge.
We had a nightmare to keep on top off sales thru the shop and the website last year when they were together, there was no way to stop a B & M customer buying the remaining stock at the same time a customer ordered online. With a remote location that will be even more impossible (not very good english, is it?).
Our decision was to close the shop and get out of B&M after 25 years and to be honest it's the best thing we ever did, we can now concentrate on the website and its growing like crazy.
Good luck on the move, hope to get to Norwich soon, work permitting.

[Luddite]

For:you are either extremely brave or reckless to open a new shop in November.
Read:(we were supposed to have opened new shop in June).We won the tender for the new shop back in February, and to be honest, its been a complete nightmare ever since. The whole deal nearly collapsed on Friday, and would have sunk the business were we not able to salvage it yesterday. So opening a shop in November, when compared to being left with no shop at all for the only period you actually make any decent money, wasn't much of a decision.

We toyed with the idea of going online only, but we love having a shop - sure its a pain in the arse sometimes - but we figure that 2 income streams are better than 1, and the move also enables us to operate 2 additional businesses from the same location. I can see the benefits of not having a shop, but for us its as much a lifestyle choice as a means of making some money.

Be good to see you when you are over our way. I'm the one with the big nose and glasses!

Nick

[jont]

sI'm the one with the big nose and glasses!


... who sounds nothing like how he types!!!!

[Luddite]

... who sounds nothing like how he types!!!!LOL. How does my typing sound?

[jont]

Tappy, tappy, click, clack :D

I type in a Scottish accent apparently :confused:

[Luddite]

Bizarrely, even though I know you don't have a scottish accent now - I still read your posts with the scots accent in my head! Anyone else going to 'fess up to how they imagine other users sound (please don't say i'm the only one!).

[NormanRouxel]

I definitely type in a Scottish accent, in spite of my French surname and being in Turkey.

[pinbrook]

can you detect my debonshire accent?

[Legends]

I don'y trype wiv an aksent cuas i do all mi tipeing in th e dark! :D

[buspassjohn]

I can see the benefits of not having a shop, but for us its as much a lifestyle choice as a means of making some money.
Nick

Going online only was a lifestyle choice for us too, we've now got a life!
Monday to Friday only after 25 years of Monday to Saturday (plus Sundays in Nov/Dec), no shoplifters, no stroppy kids breaking the display stock, spitting chewing gum on the floor, etc., etc., We used to arrest all shoplifters until the day we caught 10 and occupied 2 staff all day, holding them for police etc., we then decided it was cheaper to just tell them to P off or not bother to catch them.
No £130000 static overheads! I better not go on, it sure is a lifestyle!
Having a shop would be great if it weren't for the customers!
Hope to be up your way shortly, I'm sure i've been in the shop years ago, judging by the stuff you sell.
Do I type in a London/Essex/Suffolk accent?

[Luddite]

Going online only was a lifestyle choice for us too, we've now got a life! Thankfully, we love having a shop, but as soon as we are unhappy we'll give it up and go online only (or even better than that, i'll sell the whole business and have enough time & money to spend my days sailing round the norfolk broads sipping Bombay Sapphire)

can you detect my debonshire accent?Had you down as Cornish, so not too far out (i'm sure you'd beg to differ though!)

I definitely type in a Scottish accent, in spite of my French surname and being in Turkey.Had you down as sounding like Dennis Healy for some reason!

And while i'm at it, if George doesn't sound like Ray Winston i'll be really disappointed!

I've said far too much. Mods - please put this thread out of its misery!

[chris ashdown]

[QUOTE=Luddite] i'll sell the whole business and have enough time & money to spend my days sailing round the norfolk broads sipping Bombay Sapphire)

QUOTE]

Pop down the river to Greeeeat Yarmouth, and I will by you that G&T

[jont]

Norman - Had you down as sounding like Dennis Healy

Sean Connery surely????

[Miranda Stamp]

Not sure how your workloads pan out when you have physical customers, but I know they take up time we would otherwise be packing/answering the phone! Would love a bricks and mortar store but it's location location resulting in price price (Berkshire very expensive!).
We tend to discourage visitors as currently we are a (very nice inside) sublet of a grotty machine toolshop so there is a considerable H&S risk as our visitors have to cross a noisy factory floor where they make things from bits of metal - and the swarf works its way into our floormat by the door, just right for little toddlers to crawl on to...

What we do is run Actinic from the office by day for our day to day stuff, packing entering phone orders despatching, exporting the info to Sage. Then I either take a snapshot home on a flashdrive or transfer it to home via our VPN using PC Anywhere where I add items and tweak stuff on the site by night, transfer the file back or bring it in the next day with me. I can also log in to home or office from my laptop anywhere I can log in to a wirelsss hotspot, so can even work when away from home or a friend's house. Our bookkeeper also does the same with Sage, tending to work in the evenings at home with our pile of incoming invoices etc.

As I can see it the advantages are a regular off-site back up, rarely do we go more than 2 days without this, even if I'm on holiday, this means we don't loose a lot should either home or office get burgled or go up in smoke, plus the flexibility for mums to work at home in the evenings (we are a nice flexible workforce, office hours of course are scheduled around the school day with time off for inset days, school plays, harvest festivals and the like).

The only thing you have to insist on is a system whereby the user at the office knows if the file is at home or the office, we have the rule that it's at home first thing in the morning unless there is a message left on the screen to say it's back at the office - takes into account those essential Windows updates the computer has to do in the dead of the night and very kindly reboots your computer for you.