Location, location, location

What's that saying about location being everything? When it comes to business, in many cases it is one of the most important factors. If you're starting out in business it pays to give this topic considerable thought.

The main options are generally:

• Work from home
• Buy suitable premises – retail, industrial or whatever is required for your business type or
• Lease premises.

For many business mums working from home is the ideal choice. While this sounds great at first, it's not always practical and not everyone is disciplined enough to do this successfully. Consider:

• The age of your children (this may work for or against a home-based business)
• How disciplined you are
• Whether you have enough space
• How your family feels about this
• What the Council regulations are
• If you be employing staff and if so, if you are prepared for them to be in your home
• Whether you will have customers visiting and if so, can you suitable maintain your home? Do you have enough car parking space?
• Whether you will affect your neighbours
• Whether you will have any hazardous chemicals on the property or excessive noise
• Whether you will be creating extra waste and if so, how you will deal with that
• What implications this will bring regarding security issues, insurance, clients visiting after-hours
• If you're renting your home, will your landlords allow you to run this business from home?
• Do you need to be easily seen by customers or can you operate ‘virtually' – over the internet/mail?

Mind you, just because things don't look 100% rosy from this list doesn't mean it's not an option. If you can't have customers visiting for some reason you may choose to offer a free delivery service, making sure you factor this cost into your pricing. Meanwhile cafés are a great place to arrange meetings.

If you decide that working from home isn't a suitable option for you, the other options would be to buy or lease commercial premises – office, shed, retail store. For this option, first be aware of:

• What type of customers you will be marketing to – make sure your location is easily accessible to these people
• Your budget – to a great degree you get what you pay for, but don't sign into an expensive lease is the CBD unless you're sure you can afford it and it's the best option for you
• Where your competitors are located – in some industries it's good for competitors to be centrally located; in other industries this makes business-life much more challenging
• What is the traffic flow like?
  

Before you sign anything…

While it's tempting to cut costs wherever possible when starting out in business, this is not one of those places! Leases are complex legal documents, often full of fine print. Investing in a solicitor here may save a lot more money, time and your reputation.

In Queensland, get a copy of the Retail Shop Leases Act, available from GoPrint – Government Printer – in Brisbane.

For further guidelines on retail shop leases, contact the Retail Shop Leases Registry (Qld), Australian Retailers Association (Vic), the RAQ – Retailers Association of Queensland (Qld) and QRTSA – The Queensland Retail Traders and Shopkeepers Association (Qld). Contact http://www.business.gov.au/Business+Entry+Point/Business+Topics/.... for further information relevant to your state or territory.

Make sure you know things like:

• What happens if the business closes or is sold?
• How and when is the rent paid and to whom?
• Will there be any legal fees associated with the lease and if so, who is responsible for these?
• Who is responsible for the insurance of the premises?
• Who is responsible for the maintenance of the building and surrounding property (for example, plumbing, lawns and gardens)?
• Do the owners approve of the business you intend operating from these premises (make sure this is specified in writing within the lease)?