Denmark hill station coffee hut being thrown out

[workingmum]

Sam Berrada has spent last 8 years building his business, running cafe pronto booth in Denmark hill train station

He has now been told he has to close down and bid following the refurb for right to start again.

I'm guessing we won't end up with a local guy after but a large chain....

If you want to complain about this, sam has a petition you can sign in his booth or you could email

julia.sturgess@southeasternrailway.co.uk

[KidKruger]

Yeah that's a real shame. He'd mentioned a few weeks ago he'd no clue as to his prospects at that time.

[workingmum]

He's got petition on the go...

Maybe if you go by offer to sign it. Might help

[Irishmxx]

I am so disappointed to hear that Sam @ cafe Pronto in Denmark Hill Station is being told to close down his lovely friendly business after the refurb. To only rebid for it probably against the big monster chains. As we all know the greedy rail company with a greedy coffee chain group will not care about us as the consumer. We will all become another number. Sam @ pronto makes us all feel special & important. He gives us a smile & a chat every morning. Taking interest in us & making us all feel like a big happy community.

It is with sadness to learn that after all these years of service Sam @ Pronto has to fight for his business. LET US AS A COMMUNITY UNITE & FIGHT TO SAVE SAM @ PRONTO CAFE DENMARK HILL STATION.

[Mick Mac]

Signed petition this morning. Also about to email Julia. Suggest everyone else does the same as he has served us for so long and deserves it.

[Huguenot]

Hmmm, if you really wanted to make a go of this it might be worth...

Identifying all the key stakeholders (I'd guess Station owner (is that Network Rail?), TOCs, Station Manager, staff, passengers)

Identifying final decision making body

Identifying decision making criteria (customer satisfaction, comfort and convenience, reliability, consistency and longevity, price, appearance, revenue, variety, local community)

I'd then try to gauge the relative strengths of the incumbent against these criteria, and look to prioritise amongst stakeholders and decision makers those criteria against which Sam is likely to be more successful than a chain.

I'd also discuss with Sam what could be done to mitigate for those criteria against which he is likely to fall short.

I'm guessing that Sam will score highly against criteria like customer satisfaction, comfort and convenience, price, variety and local community.

However it may be that the decision making body is currently scoring according to appearance, revenue, reliability and longevity.

If you want to win the argument, a petition simply isn't enough - you need to prove that the needs of all stakeholders are best served by judging the winners according to Sam's advantages, not Costa Crappee.

[Mick Mac]

Jeez, Hugs. Wake up and smell the coffee. It's a small business. It doesn't have the people with time to dedicate to the cause. If all of its customers support the petition and email campaign, then their popularity will be obvious.

[Huguenot]

I understand that Mick Mac, the problem is that Costa Crappee will have plenty of people dedicated to the cause.

There's no evidence in these situations that formless petitions work. In fact it's likely to be dismissed as the work of sentimental conservatives with goldfish memories. 'Don't worry', they will say, 'these guys will soon love a new stall just as much'

However, I do know that if you run a piece of research that grades the importance of factors such as continuity, local relevance and familiarity and these score highly that they WILL be listened to.

People in offices like looking at graphs, they don't like opinions. Don't whinge about it or snoot about it from the university of hard knocks, give them a graph to look at.

If you couple that with a willingness for Sam to renovate his stall in keeping with the renovated building and you have a serious chance of keeping him.

That's all it is.

If his supporters are not willing to make this effort them all it really does is prove to the decision makers that you never really cared anyway, and that their dismissal of you as sentimentalists is well founded.

So, waddayoudo?

PS Why do I care? Because I love small business. I liked the parochial quirkiness of Sam's stall. He was, and I guess is, a tryer. We could all do with learning from that. He deserves your help, but more importantly in failing to help him you speak to a greater community malaise.

[Jason mcmillan]

We should protest this kind of crappy decision. Today it is Sam's business, tomorrow may be yours or mine. We need to get everyone else aware that hidden shark could kill small business,

Do they care who's paying for his bills at the end of the month. We need to put it on the media and the newspapers. Minimum we can do to spot who is hidden under the cloud and destroying small community businesses.