Croff Bakehouse

One of the biggest surprises when opening a new store?

Not knowing whether you’ll be too quiet or too busy.

Most people worry about not having enough customers.

What nobody talks about is what happens when you get more customers than expected.

Suddenly you’re trying to:
🥐 make more products
👨‍🍳 roster more staff
📦 order more stock
☕ maintain service standards
😅 and somehow keep everything running smoothly

The first few weeks are all about learning.

For us, that meant adjusting production, changing rosters, refining systems and constantly reviewing how the team was coping.

One lesson we’ve learned over the years:

Good service is expensive.
Bad service is even more expensive.

Looking back, we definitely underestimated how busy our new flagship store would be.

It’s created challenges, but honestly, that’s a much better problem to have than an empty store.

For the business owners out there:

What surprised you most when you first opened your business?