Since Starbucks opened a 450 square foot shipping container store in Washington in 2011, shipping container cafés have been on the rise. It’s for a good reason, too, because shipping crate restaurants bring many benefits to a restaurateur. Luckily, there are enough shipping containers to support the shipping container cafe trend, which is gaining popularity by the day.
What are the reasons behind the increasing uptake and love for shipping container cafes?
A Shipping Container Café is a Long-Term Investment With High ROI
When you rent retail space for your restaurant, you pay a considerable amount in rent. This monthly expense can reduce your capacity to expand your café, especially if you’re just getting started. It’s more economically viable to buy a shipping container and modify it into a café. This eliminates one of your biggest recurring expenses — rent. Additionally, you get to keep your modified shipping container as is in case you relocate. You would have to pull down all the fixtures and fittings you installed to make your customers comfortable in rented premises, such as ventilation and air conditioning units. This will save you many installation and repair costs. Ultimately, you will have fewer expenses operating a shipping container café. As a result, you will increase your profits and run a more successful restaurant.
You Can Modify a Shipping Container Café to Bring Out the Woo Factor
Almost always, prospective customers judge a book by its cover. This means your container café must be appealing and attractive to the eye. Generally, people are attracted to new and creative innovations. A unique shipping container café design will get customers streaming in your restaurant, while your quality of services and food served will keep them coming. Shipping containers are easy to customize. You can install ventilation, retail-style lighting, commercial vinyl flooring, and any other amenities you need in your work area. It’s also easy to install a custom business sign. All of these modifications will make your shipping container café alluring and charming to your customers.
You Can Easily Scale Your Café and Expand Your Capacity
When you need to expand your restaurant, you don’t have to start scouting for new retail space. Instead, you can buy another shipping container and stack it on top of your existing container café. In fact, most shipping container cafes have two floors. To maximize the utility of limited ground space, two-storeyed shipping container cafes are ideal. The good thing is that you don’t need much ground space to expand your restaurant, as you can always go up. Expanding your shipping container café is faster and more cost-effective.
It’s Easy to Buy, Customize, and Install a Shipping Container Café
The traditional brick and mortar cafes take more time and resources to build from the ground up. Even when you rent an established retail space, it will take you more time and money to customize the place to your liking. It’s much easier and faster to buy a custom shipping container and have it modified. Good thing you’ll find shipping container dealers that can sell, modify, and deliver your shipping container. You could also order your shipping container and have it modified on site.
Shipping Container Cafes are Hygienic
With the high-hygiene standards required in the hospitality industry, it’s a good thing that container cafes are easy to clean. You can easily clean all parts of your container restaurant with water and soap and keep off dust and rust. This will help you maintain high levels of hygiene without utilizing a lot of time and labor. Any improvement that saves you time and money in the restaurant business is a welcome addition.
Shipping containers are readily available. Of the more than 17 million shipping containers globally, only six million are in active use. This leaves more than 10 million shipping containers for other purposes, such as pop up containers, booth shipping containers, and shipping container restaurants. The affordability, portability, and the ease of modification and installation of shipping containers make container cafes hugely attractive to all restaurateurs.