Cyber Cafe? Suggestions?

Hi everyone,

I have an opportunity to open a Cyber Cafe, my son and several of his friends have expressed an issue to open one up.

My questions are purely for my own "peace of mind" as I will have to put a significant amount of collateral to start up.

I open the floor to all of AO as to their opinions of these types of establishments around the world, and any suggestions from you on what you would like to see, or have, at a similar place should one open up near you. Would you go to one that offered high speed Internet access, multi-player games, a space for board games like D&D, Battle Tech, etc.? Snacks and Drinks, frozen pizzas, etc. ?
I have loads of ideas myself, but, alas... I have never been to one to experience it. I live in the United States midwestern region, high speed internet access here is only for ISP's and businesses. We don't have DSL or Cable Internet access, just 56k dial up for 95% of this region. I have had high speed access in the past at places I have worked, I MISS IT A LOT!!! I would probably spend a lot of time at one just so I can have that "incredi-uber-fast-bandwidth" I so long for anymore.

:hippy:

We have one here. But it's weird, they don't offer snacks, or anything like that, and they're b open 24/7, but you pass by during the day, and it's empty, but all night long, it's packed. So what hours are you contemplating? Oh, and don't forget the printers...

I think it would be a good idea myself.
and by the way D&D is an RPG not a board game

I spend a lot of time programming at Starbucks and these are a few of the things I always wish for:

1. Task lights (so there isn't one God-awful bright light).
2. Tables large enough for at least two laptops AND books/papers.
3. Lots of electrical outlets....not just in the walls.
4. Comfortable seating / variety of seating.
5. Not just coffee but beer, too (GOOD beer!!).
6. Stay open later than 11.00pm.

I wish you lots of luck...it sounds exciting! :)

The few cyber cafes that have opened up around my area have closed down within a few months, as nobody goes in there, and fast internet access is soo cheap now a days. The only place that does well is a computer shop that has a LAN set up in the back room of about 10 computers which has HL : ounterstrike playing. They charge £1 for 20 mins, and its full of kids ALL DAY, they must make a fortune.

Good Luck anyway

ive always wanted to open a place like that, and i happen to live in iowa currently...and we have high speed internet all over the place..*hint* *hint* ;) anyways if i was gonna make one it would have two diff parts.one big room being for LAN parties and for games like Magic and such, and the other for ppl who just want to chill and do homework or just have quite.snacks and such would be a must and so would be a bar.you could advertise daily LAN parties, everyday a diff game UT/counter-strike/diablo etc.etc. you could have a small book store in there built into the chillin part of the cafe. sell things like linux/windows/programming books....maybe even computer parts....i dunno if it was me i would just try to make it a oasis for the geek.and of course youd have to have music, get some bose speakers set up and a bad ass system and put on a diff kinda music each day or after a awhile you might find out what your custemers like and go from there.you could even hold seminars there.like on friday nights you could come in and give a talk on computer related topics.or have someone else do it....man, theres lots of things i would try and have goin on.hope this helped.take it easy.

i think something like that would be awesome. a cafe area, some computers for general use, some dedicated to lan games...

you could also organize special interest "hacker" clubs or classes.... simple networking or software groups to meet. kinda like 2600 meetings. sounds like it could be fun.

alot of cyber cafe's don't serve alot of food because they don't want people to spill it on their computers... Beer would be a problem since you have adults as well as children in the same rooms, where it would be easy for someone underaged to get an alcoholic drink. It also adds alot of issues when it comes down to zoning and permits... not worth it. and besides, who'd wanna deal with a pack of drunken middle aged wanna be special forces?????

perhaps a room (rented by the hour??) with a large solid hexagonally gridded surface with good chairs and access to pop and pizza, would do nicely for D&D fans, an area in the front of the building with browsing stations (4 or so stations with no games, purely browsers and office suites attached to printers for people to do work and relax... then a larger section with 10 or so computers that are very capable of playing games, keeping the numbers at round numbers easily divisible into teams.. so that you can have in house matches..

that leaves you needing an internet connection.. perhaps you could contact your phone company, and some youth clubs in the area to see if they would be interested in helping you to set up places where kids could hangout and have access to equipment that they might only have access to at school.... Well not the phone company for that, call them about availability of t1 or the like connections...

i'll think more and see if i come up with more later...

The cafe' I usually go to in Florida is nice. They serve coffee, danish, well mostly breakfast stuff. You pay by the hour and can print and pay by the page. These places only seem to be successful in tourist areas and sometimes malls.

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Beer would be a problem since you have adults as well as children in the same rooms

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I see what you're saying, g00n, but beer and children can be found in the same room at most "family" restaurants. I don't see how a cyber cafe would be any different. But you do bring up a good point about permits and zoning....severing alcohol would definitely have an influence on these (though it wouldn't stop me ;) ).

I thought hatebreed had a really good idea about two different rooms -- one for special meetings, gatherings, and groups, and another for general use.

I remember when I went to A&M a few of the coffee houses there had small book and game libraries so that you could play or read while you relaxed. You could also have a sort of policy where people can donate books and games to the "library" for a free coffee or something like that.

I don't want to be discouraging, but around here they go out of business as fast as they go up. There is, in fact, a P4 1.8 Ghz Dell 4400 sitting not 5 feet away from me right now purchased for $200 when the last one went under.

You may be able to make some money off of LAN parties if you put good switches in and have the hardware to handle the games. Not having broadband seriously limits the amount of surfing that people are going to do.

I'd focus on making it as technology friendly as a place as possible. MathGirls suggestions were excellent.

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Originally posted here by aeallison
Hi everyone,

I have an opportunity to open a Cyber Cafe, my son and several of his friends have expressed an issue to open one up.

My questions are purely for my own "peace of mind" as I will have to put a significant amount of collateral to start up.

I open the floor to all of AO as to their opinions of these types of establishments around the world, and any suggestions from you on what you would like to see, or have, at a similar place should one open up near you. Would you go to one that offered high speed Internet access, multi-player games, a space for board games like D&D, Battle Tech, etc.? Snacks and Drinks, frozen pizzas, etc. ?
I have loads of ideas myself, but, alas... I have never been to one to experience it. I live in the United States midwestern region, high speed internet access here is only for ISP's and businesses. We don't have DSL or Cable Internet access, just 56k dial up for 95% of this region. I have had high speed access in the past at places I have worked, I MISS IT A LOT!!! I would probably spend a lot of time at one just so I can have that "incredi-uber-fast-bandwidth" I so long for anymore.

:hippy:

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Sounds like a good idea.. I know that if I lived in a big enough city that had cafes like these present, I would go to them every now and then. I'd say you have to look at it this way - who do you want your customers to be? The young, teenage or college-age who are looking for a place to hang out and have some fun, or do you want your customers to be the working type - young or old, but a little more interested in a place to work than a place to hang out. Once you figure that out, you can decide what kind of services and resources to offer - if you are going to cater to a younger crowd, resources for LAN games and parties might be a pretty good idea - an older crowd may not be as interested in that. The same goes for food and beverages offered (if any) - younger crowds would be looking for pizza, soft drinks, etc. while an older crowd may be looking for bagels, pastries, etc.

Something that may attract business is that of high-speed access - you may have an advantage in your area since it sounds like most home users don't have high-speed availability. If you can accquire high-speed net access, that's just another benefit that your cafe can offer.

Are there any similar businesses of this kind in your area? If the area is saturated with these, then quite honestly, you'd have to think long and hard about trying to break into that market. If you are the only unique one, then you'd have an advantage.

You might want to try market surveys just to see if the area residents may be interested in giving business to place like this. The market surveys would provide invaluable feedback as far as the potential sucess of a business such as this.

I think it's a pretty cool idea and I only wish that I had a few in my area...

I don't want to discourage you, but the first thing you should bring to mind is that your plan is an economic challenge. You should do a careful research whether you have found a gap in the market in your region.

- Will you be able to attract enough potential customers as you need?
- Will they find your cafe just by passing by?
- Or do you have to spend lots of money in advertising?
- What about already established competitors?
- How much money has to be invested?
- Will you be able to bridge the first months without earning money?

I don't know anything about the structure of the environment in which you plan to establish your firm. But these were the questions I became aware of when I read your post and I think they apply under any cirumstances. As soon as you are sure that you have a real chance you should go on to the technical details, which of course are much more interesting for someone like you and me :-)

I actually had an entire business plan set out for a gaming/cyber cafe that I was going to open. It turned out that the overhead cost ended up around $200,000 dollars. The best advice I can give you is this:


www.igames.org


good luck

Wow! Thanks for all of the great ideas/advice. I will atempt to cover everthing but I might miss a couple of things.

I want to cater to the younger crowds, I want it to be alccohol and smoke free indoors where the equipment is, I was going to put in a large Smoker/Bar-b-que and serve real hickory smoked meats, as for serving beer I am not totally against a good beer now and then, but the licensing is hard to get here, I live in a region we call the bible belt and liquer licensing has to go before the churches here as well. A seperate room for RPG "or board" games and such is in the plans, as was a room for lan parties. I had not thought of work areas though, that is a great idea, what would you like best? Private cubicles or small private rooms? I think adding a print server and a couple of nice printers would be enough around here.

As for a market here there are presently zero establishments here that are doing this, and getting in the internet T1s and such is not a problem, runs about $700.00 US per month per T1. I was planning on building a 40 foot by 40 ft 2 story building to house this all in.

As for the snacks and such, that will have to be away from any of the equipment, I think theere would be enough room that we could even have special events there too such as a live band or a banquet once in a while, I have apx an acre to park cars on. I could start this up with as little as 35 to 40,000 dollars.

Did I leave anything out? Keep the good stuff coming, this is exactly the type of input I was looking for. :D

Hi aeallison :)

I dunno where to start, this is a big and nice idea you have. Let me tell you what experience has shown to me. My best friend here owns a web cafe. It runs well due to the fact that my friend and myself setup that network. Its the only webcafe in the area where everything works, from printing, scanning to alot of online access possibilities. Also an important role here at my location is that the laws on the internet are very loose (kinda no internet laws at all here :p ). Now then. Allow me to compare 2 types of webcafes to you in detail, telling you the negative and positive sides of each. I will compare our netcafe to one i saw in Holland and Germany.

Netcafe Holland/UK (easynet):

A huge building with about 200 work-stations running on high speed access. Theres a machine on the front of the entrance where you can buy your online time. There is no drinks or food allowed inside, and its very quiet inside there. The only available resources on the stations are a web browser and mIRC. Nothing else is allowed on the machines, and no HD access either. The positive side of this is you save alot of money for employees, its all simple and very little maintainance is needed, since the computers are locked up so tight that you cant do anything else on them. Also its very very cheap. They have no applications such as office, or paint-software. The bad side is (along with not having any applications available) that the customers do not feel well when they go there. No smoking, no drinks, no food, noone to ask for assistance if needed since everything is automated. Its more like a high-tech graveyard in there, all you hear is the keyboards. Nothing else. If you need help in there, well then your F$&*%. :p Reminds me of a school.

Our webcafe here in Greece:

The first step we made was to make sure that the shop would work alone pretty well without the computer section. A good idea is to have the computers as an addon to the place. Meaning that we have a beautiful bar in there, we offer drinks, coffee, toasts, crepes etc... Nice music in the background etc.. We offer alot of applications on our systems, from office, paint software (psp), different chats (mirc, pirch, x-chat), we offer ssh and telnet clients, and a few games once in a while (games are illegal on public computers in greece at this moment). We have 2 people working there who both know a bit about computers, so we can assist people who have questions or need help on something (which is very very important). We liven up the place, with friendliness, we let the customers feel well. The Good side with this is, you, the customer feels very well here, you have assistance, we offer good music, drinks, simple food, and you have a large variety of applications at your disposal (also scanners etc...). The bad side is, we have to pay 2 employees, we have alot of administration and maintaining todo, and we have to keep our prices very low which is hard.


Also, since i have seen you on AO for some time, i hope i need not mention the security involved. There has to be some sort of security since your offering public computers. You have to make sure that you have a well configured firewall and proxy. You have to make sure that noone can access certain areas of the system and network. You have to make sure that noone can bring his own software nor download it. Same for physical security, as in bringing a bootable OS etc... with them. The owner of the easy net is now in court, because users at his cafes have been downloading music and movies (his physical security seems to suck). Another issue is the OS. If its windows be sure to have all the needed licenses etc... since other webcafes tend to play foul tricks to get you out of buisiness. The last thing you need is a lawsuit with Microsoft or the companies whos applications you have installed. A nice solution for this is knoppix. Almost no maintainance at all needed, a large variety of software, a nice GUI, and stable the way linux should be. We use windows here because noone in our area knows that an other OS exists. Thats also an important point, do we say to the customer: "Use what we offer or go F*&#($* off", or do we say: "We will offer what the customer wants in every case". We chose the second one. The customers want Windows, and IE. Then let them have it. Make sure you tweak the systems as well as possible. (Disable regedit, make sure the AV and proxy have rules on what is downloaded, which sites may be illegal. How bout the porn sites issue? Will you allow users to view porn in your cafe? And also like UHU has said, what about the market, is there a gap for it? One way to secure yourself from this is to make sure the cafe can survive without the computers. Make it an awesome place for people of all ages to hang out. Once that is established, add the cyber part to it. That way if the market should devour you with the computers (say easy net opens up in your area), then atleast you have a buisiness running which will not be affected. Then....56k is NOT enough for internet access. Its not even close to enough. Our cafe has broadband cable, and at times we have major laaaaaaaags. My opinion on this is, 15 computers or lower should atleast have ISDN/128. Anythying bigger than that must have a high speed with enough broadband. Theres nothing worse than waiting 20 minutes to open up their hotmail accounts. Have a look at www.diktyocafe.gr .

Also a nice programm to help you manage the cafe is : http://www.netcafes.info/
That is if you choose windows. If you choose linux or another *nix OS, then just write a few lil scripts to manage the work. The work is:

1 - Time a customer uses the computers
2 - Drinks/food
3 - Printing/scanning/cdr etc..

This should be controlled by software.

I hope that i have been of some sort of help. If you need more info, let me know ;)

Cheers.

aeallison >> the only problem i would see about this is, are there many kids in the area? I mean sure you will have your adults that don't want to pay for their net access or go to a library to use a computer but the kids is where the money is. 10-20 years old or so will be more prone to stopping by after school or whatever to play games, or just hang out. I would recommend that you have a nice laser printer and copy machine, as that will attract more adults than kids, so it will balance out. But no, i wouldnt recommend doing it unless you are doing this in an area where the kids are plentiful... make sure you get the word out that there is going to be a place where "You can come play games!" and stuff so that attracts dem der chitlins. Anyway, good luck.

Hello erok. I partly disagree with the kids and the money part. Kids dont have money. Grown ups do. Grown ups will spend more money on the extras apart from the computers. Kids will have enough money for a rounded up hour or 2. Give the cafe some style. Let it attract grown ups more. If there are too many kids all playing games and making noise, that would let many grownups feel uncomfortable. Base line is, you wanna make money. So get the money from the people who actually have money. Our webcafe here makes alot more money than the kids. (4 Kids will share on coca cola with 4 straws). Its the printing, the variety of work applications as well as what the cafe has to offer in general that will bring in money. Kids will just play games and not leave alot of money. That does not mean to not make it kid friendly, but its the grownups you will want.

Cheers.

I have limited exposure to these places - they always seem full of 14 year old boys looking at porn! I'm hoping to find one in Austin next week though, so I'll report back on whether it's the same your side of the planet.

Of those I've been in, on the negative side:

(1) Lots of places to drink coffee, yet only one bathroom (what is *that* all about)? This bathroom is usually filthy.
(2) Nowhere to safely store your stuff while you are working. I had to keep my rollerblades on my lap because they said it was dangerous to dump them on the floor next to the machine.
(2) No graphics programs to play with.
(3) In England, the coffee is gross and the snacks are unpleasantly cheesy (and this includes the chocolate croissants!)
(4) People who play walkmans really LOUD next to me.
(5) Extortionate printing costs

On the plus side:
(1) Web design training classes - in this country you can even get the govt to pay you to run them if you let a certain number of unemployed people in. This fills in the slack times (early mornings, late afternoon).
(2) If the PC breaks - I don't have to get the screwdrivers out.
(3) Infrequent but helpful access to print services (color laserprinters, lamination, photocopying, scanner etc.)

Cheerio

Rachel
(demob happy)

About the kids....I can tell you if a place like that was full of, or even sort of full of kids.....I would never come back. But, I am kind of crotchety. ;)

ok i agree with everyone that kids will be pretty easy to draw if you have lan games and snack bars.

maybe you can try to draw adults by offereing fax, printing, copying, etc., services like a kinkos. i worked at the copy center at my school for a semester, they bring in a ton by printing and binding large reports, resumes, study manuals and things like that.

I am sorry I havn't had access to an internet connection for a while...long story I won't bore you with.

Thank you for the suggestions. Let me soak this all in and I'll recap...

instronics

Your description of your friends establishment is just what I have in my mind's eye. Unfortunately, my personal research among the populace here was not very favorable. The kids here from about 15 up to 20 years old would not have a easy way to get here unless they have a family member or friend to drive them. The property I own, that I could put this on is almost 5 miles out of town. Way too far to walk for the kids of today. The local radius to me in a 20 mile radius is only about 7 or 8 thousand, most of whom are either the elderly retired folks, or under age 15. This area is VERY technologically backwards. Most of the group of men that are aged 25 to 60, are farmers, and laborers, who think computers are only used to keep records and graph charts on their crops and livestock, the ladies around her that do use computers, all seem to be fixated on MSN Zone games and chat rooms. And those people have their home PC's. (mostly emachines they get free with a 3 year internet contract) I am still getting people that insist on bringing their antique xts ,286s, 386s, etc. to configure their 28.8 or 33.6 modems to work with the free AOL cd they keep getting in the mail. You know...the frizbee disks that never seem to make it in our homes :D

I haven't given up the idea entirely on this project though. I am looking for some property or abuilding inside the city limits close to the High School. In the hours after school and before their evening meal most of the students would be there. The ones I have spoken with assure me that if it was located anywhere inside the city limits (where they could walk without feeling like they were working or something) that they would hang out there, so they don't have to go home and help Mom, and/or Dad, with chores around the house, or on their family farm.

This will require a substantial investment. To quote xmaddness:

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I actually had an entire business plan set out for a gaming/cyber cafe that I was going to open. It turned out that the overhead cost ended up around $200,000 dollars.

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For a lot within walking distance from the schools, available city provided utilities, an OC92 fiber cable providing an almost direct (one hop) connection the main fiber trunk that runs from coast to coast. Supposed to be less than 4 nano seconds latency to either coast.

Costs:
$80,000 Land
$30,000 For a Prefab building I would have to erect myself.
$700 monthly, For each T1 of Bandwidth. (If I use throttling I think I could support 24 users with plenty of B/W for gaming online)
$10,000 For furnishings and misc. fixtures.
$15,000 For computer equipment. (I can be quite resourceful when I build my own servers and workstations)

I need to go run some errands so I will check back on this later. If anyone feels I left anything out just post it here. ;)