Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
DUBLIN HAS DEVELOPED a fondness for doughnuts over the past few years, but the opening of few outlets has matched the Krispy Kreme madness of the last 24 hours.
The outlet in Blanchardstown shopping centre opened its doors at 7am on Wednesday to a queue of several hundred people.
Doughnut enthusiasts took to social media to document the experience, with several parents it seems, roped in to get there before school began.
Local Fine Gael councillor Ted Leddy was one of the first inside the doors and said he wasn’t prepared for all the fuss.
I wasn’t quite prepared for what a big deal it was. There were about 300 people queuing at 7am, some had been there since 4am.
Leddy says he’s not a “doughnut man himself” but is happy about the store’s opening:
I was happy to be there because it’s 120 jobs and a lot of them are local jobs.
The craze shows no sign of dying down just yet, with queues reported from early once again this morning.
Martha Dowling from Clonee said her children bribed her to pick some of the sugary treats up on her way home from work yesterday.
My kids made a deal with me, they would clean downstairs in my house if I got them a box of Krispy Kremes on the way home.
The new outlet has a drive-thru facility and Dowling said when she arrived at about 7pm yesterday evening, she was warned she may have to queue for up to an hour. However she got through the queue within 20 minutes and secured a mixed box for her entrepreneurial children.
Dowling says the house was “lovely and clean” by the time she got home.
Despite the queues, a spokesperson for AA Roadwatch says there hasn’t been any noticeable traffic disruption as a result of the opening. The AA’s Barry Aldworth said: “We’re aware of the long queues, but it doesn’t seem to be having any actual impact on traffic.”
In a statement, Krispy Kreme said it was ”overjoyed to have people from all around Ireland share the excitement of opening day”.
Leddy said he wouldn’t judge anyone for their enthusiasm about the opening: “It seems to be a bit of a phenomenon, it was a bit odd, will it last or not I don’t know.”
This must be some kind of joke, right?
Crowd funding by it’s very nature is usually consumer-centric. So I would imagine this is a bad suggestion for a B2B SME. And a lot of SME’s in Ireland are B2B.
Is there a crowd funding platform out there that isn’t consumer-centric and is based on getting shares for investment?
You’re looking more at angel investor route there. You could also look at a co-destiny arrangement with significant customers. That is where there is extremely close cooperation between a service provider and a customer such that they are almost one (e.g. A well functioning outsourcing arrangement). In such a scenario, your customer may work with you and help you grow your business as the rate of return for spare funds in a bank is so poor at the moment.
Contact me on twitter if you have any questions and I can talk you through a few things if you want.
NEWFLASH FROM ERSI….Banks are shite, banks are shite!! Just whats needed…the out of touch preaching to the untouchables!!
The very fact that Dr?? Martina Lawless would suggest Crowdfunding as a viable option for anything over 1-2% of SMEs in Ireland shows her and her organisation’s detachment from reality…The ERSI is the place that needs to ‘catch up’ and give some real alternatives to the banking sewer that is the unavoidable staple for so many self-employed and SMEs in Ireland.
The idea of borrowing from tax-funded bailed-out banks so you can make money to pay them interest and pay more taxes on any profit you make to pay ad finites for their bail-out is insane!
Really? You seem to have a loose grasp on business there.
The options are very straight forward:
Bank loan: will seek concomitant funding and/or security over loan against personal assets. Benefit is funding / risk is losing it all.
Equity swap: in return for a capital injection from a private investor or investors, a business gets access to funding but loses some of its independence. This is not necessarily a bad thing but it does mean you pay an awfully high price for what can be a modest level of start-up funding if you become successful. It just depends on how confident you are about your business and how much you’re willing to relinquish to have a shot at success.
Co-destiny funding: two businesses share business expansion plans and without formally joining help each other realise each other’s expansion plans. One may have spare cash that they are willing to advance because of the close relationship for a reasonable return like 5%. The other gets the funding and can expand operations such that it can take on new customers and build the size and scale to be able to support their co-destiny partner’s business.
Flotation: alternative investment markets for products and service but this tends to be down the line.
Crowd-funding: raise small amounts of modest funding levels in return for equity or some kind of benefit in kind.
There aren’t too many other ways to do this beside merging and then losing independence. Sin é, that’s it. So there aren’t alternatives. Besides it’s not ESRI’s job to innovate, it is a SMEs job to find a way.
@robespierre. Your post is informative and succinct but I fear from its tone that you may give your advice from behind a desk(no offence meant and apologies if I am wrong). The options you speak of all infer a loss of independence to some degree and if you have worked, planned, saved, discussed ad nauseam every detail of your start up/expansion/survival, I fear the way you have delivered the options to finance in your post would not be so ‘clinical’. I have listened to many advisors who never took the ownership/self-employed plunge, and they all had answers from a book but never from experience unfortunately. Re ERSI, you are right, they are not the innovators, however may I suggest that they should just give the facts then, not opinion, and allow us, the innovators, to decide for ourselves without the gratuitous dog-on-the-street ‘advice’.
Nope, I left a well paid position in a tier one consultancy to run my own business. I am building from a modest base of my own savings and am running one business (an advisory one) to build the business I quit to set-up primarily through equity sharing with individuals I convince to take the jump with me.
The options are simple and few and that may seem clinical. Simple and easy are two very different things however.
Absolutely correct but when 50% have now website and a large amount of the other simply have a magazine sites crowd funding is like going to mars.
Ultimately it’s adapt or die. Micro financing and crowd sourcing or angel investors are a great bet but so many small businesses offer generic services without significant differentiation that this kind investment is not really relevant. On the product side crowd sourcing is easier and more obvious but generational mind sets can affect this.
Finally, as a small business owner, we’re right to be wary of banks. The first thing they look for is a personal guarantee or a hold over your family home. We’ve seen how that has worked out over the past 7 years.
My top tip is I give a 10% discount for half the money up front. It means I am guaranteed a break even level of cash. While you need loans / capital to expand and build scale without cash you have no business. Bird in the hand is very much my perspective.
It is called invoice discounting and service providers don’t do it enough. It’s harder for products but you may be able to do it on high volume order to reduce non payment risk and maintain adequate working capital reserves.
Do you need Personal Loan?
Business Cash Loan?
Unsecured Loan
Fast and Simple Loan?
Quick Application Process?
Approvals within 24-72 Hours?
No Hidden Fees Loan?
Funding in less than 1 Week?
Get unsecured working capital?
Email us:(flourishloancredite@gmail.com
Application Form:
=================
Full Name:…………….
Loan Amount Needed:.
Purpose of loan:…….
Loan Duration:..
Gender:………….
Marital status:….
Location:……….
Home Address:..
City:…………
Country:……
Phone:……….
Mobile / Cell:….
Occupation:……
Monthly Income:….
Email us(flourishloancredite@gmail.com)
Dear Sir/ Madam
Are you interested in obtaining a loan at an interest rate of 3%, you
need a loan for a business transaction, buying a car, house
purchase bad credit card and other E.T.C we give out long term loan
for five to fifty years maximum with 3% interest in
Maybe you like it
well tell us the amount you need so that we will send to you the terms and
provided that, if you’re really interested in getting
loan from us,
Loans issued in Great British Pounds and U.S. dollar.
We can give you the best satisfaction in getting a loan from us. as
given guarantees and insurance that you will get your loan amount in your
Personal bank account in your country. What takes only 48 hours
Banking process. We also provide software and
unsecured loans for
Running your business. you can kindling reach us via < ponyeefastloan.ch@cash4u.com << <<
have your say