LQQKing to Rent 100+ Flat Screens

Relative

Hi, i'm opening a new Cyber Cafe in Dublin City centre in January 2002. It'll have broadband access for 100+ terminals and I was hoping to get some advice re which hardware company could supply the neccessary equipment ?

beaver

AFAIK Dell are widely enough used for this sort of thing. I've personally got no experience of it, though.

-Ross

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When I was young my mother told me not to look into the sun; so once, when I was six, I did...

Shad0r

Quite seriously the best advice I can give you (and you can trust me when I say I know what I'm talking about) is:

Dont bother. When I say dont bother I of course mean dont even bother making your business plan. By January 2002 the market wont be there. In fact for a "start-up" net cafe business there is no market in Dublin anymore.

Alis

Shador, did you read this?

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=30794

I imagine with his jewellers, web development company and a new book coming out later this year, Relative may have to delay the launch of his Internet cafe

amp

Relative asked straight forward question Alis. What happens in that thread stays in that thread. Lets not bring it here.

Must... restrain .... sarcastic... urge

Enygma

That threads almost impossible to follow anyways...
Shad0r can you explain yourself there when you say you know what you're talking about?

Alis

amp wrote:

Relative asked straight forward question Alis. What happens in that thread stays in that thread. Lets not bring it here.

Ouch, my wrist hurts, but I've learn't my lesson

amp

Nothing personal Alis, but as a newbie with just over 50 posts I MUST DISCIPLINE YOU

Shad0r

Alis, yeah I read that thread..but eh, ...what amp said.

Originally posted by Enygma
That threads almost impossible to follow anyways...
Shad0r can you explain yourself there when you say you know what you're talking about?

Yep I can. I have been intimatly involved for nearly the last two and a half years in getting net house where it is today. At one point or other I have had a part in everything from lease negotiation to running varying stores to marketing to..well you get the idea.

Why do you ask?

Enygma

I was just curious that's all.
I was just wondering why you were so certain that there is no room for a start-up cafe in Dublin.
No need to go into details I guess

tHE vAGGABOND

'no room in the industry' > for someone else to do battle with nethouse

I think a 'easyeverything' style netcafe would clean up over here. Cheap and cheerful

Enygma

I've never been in a Netcafe (I hear there's one coming to Cork soon) but I know what I'd like to see in an Internet Caff:

• Gotta be clean
• Web Access Room/Gaming Room
• Comfortable atmosphere (armchair setting)
• Different payment scheme
• Somewhere you could just hang-out

The worst part is the fact that you're always watchful of how long you're on. A 'Day Pass' or something would work for me. Pay £10 or whatever and get a card for the day, then you could wander in and out as you pleased.

Shad0r

Originally posted by tHE vAGGABOND
'no room in the industry' > for someone else to do battle with nethouse

Not so much that there is no room for someone to do battle with us because competition is almost always a good thing for any industry. I was just refering in this case to a "start-up" (i.e. a first time venture into net cafes). There are too many established chains already in place, such as Net House, Net Shop, Internet Exchange, Planet, Talk & Surf and DnC (to name just a few), most of whom if needs be can wheather a price war or other agressive business moves made by the competition.

More specifically the "city centre" was mentioned, which I assumed to mean Dublin 1 and 2. My reasoning behind saying dont even make a business plan for it was because I know for a fact that Net House are going to have 3 more stores in D1 and 2 open before the end of this year. One of which will have 150 systems for client access and is just off O'Connell Street on Abbey St.

These are just our immediate plans for Dublin, I'm sure that Gary in DnC and the guys that own net shop and planet and all the others probably have plans up their sleeves aswell.

Originally posted by tHE vAGGABOND
I think a 'easyeverything' style netcafe would clean up over here.

People say that all the time, yet still Easy Everything haven't opened! I'm curious if people think that this is because they just havent gotten around to considering Ireland yet? Especially when you consider that they already have 20 huge sites around Europe.

A couple of reasons that mite be why:

a) EE rely on huge volumes of people to make their money as they charge very little for access. With the public transport the way it is in Dublin they probabaly feel they cant get that volume.
b) Dublin has a relatively low population density when compared with other cities EE have opened in. (that is actually second hand info from someone else in the industry, I havent checked it)
c) Unavilability of property. EE (going on comparisons with where they have located in other cities) would only probably be interested in opening on either O'Connell Street or Grafton Street, neither of which have the kind of property EE would be looking for available at any sort of reasonable price if at all.

Originally posted by tHE vAGGABOND
Cheap and cheerful

Cheap? Yes, they are. Cheerful? Well it depends on what you are looking for. If you want to do almost anything else outside of http, more specifically games then you will be anything but cheery imo.

When I was in EE in Amsterdam, the only things I was able to do were: check my mail, check planetarion and after a bit of hassle I managed to get a crappy irc client running. (I could only join one channel with it, if memory serves, and using it was more hassle than enjoyment)

meglome

I going to do something fairly rare here and agree with Shad0r Within the next six months things are going to be very ugly from a business point of view in the Net cafe scene in Dublin city. Prices in most places have fallen to a reasonable level. In DNC we charge a minimum of £2 per hour and a maximum of £3 per hour (not including special offers which may go from £1 per hour). This is a fair price considering how expensive it is to do business in Dublin.

This is going to have to be consolidation in the market as we cannot keep up this growth. I'm sure Neil would agree with me that it will ultimitely help no one at all if people start cutting each others throats and going out oif business.

As someone who has been in Easyeverything stores in London, Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam I have to say that I really don't like them at all. If you want to browse the internet for a couple of hours or send email from your browser then great but for anything else they are terrible. Notwithstanding the fact that nearly everything else you do costs extra. A b&w print in London costs 50p Sterling compared to 10p Irish in DNC. And forget about playing any games.

The bottom line is that if you don't have experience running Internet Cafes then think long and hard about it in Dublin now. The places at the top of the pile will ride the storm that's coming but those at the bottom may be in trouble. I have noticed that some of the new places around our Temple Bar store have lowered their prices again but they are still not getting the numbers in as they are not providing the right service.

gl . Gary.

amp

Is that six months from when Shador posted or when you did Meglome?

meglome

Do you want me to go around and hold the guys hand aswell... I've said enough

Hobbes

Slap a netcafe out on the northside somewhere (say Raheny or Santry) so I don't have to go into town.

Nearly every second street now in Dublin city up to Inchicore has a net cafe on them (they seem to breed more next to laundrettes).

Personally the only thing I can think of that will kill off the netcafes is cheap broadband. I was in Boston/Cambridge area when the cheap broadband was taking off and I saw a number of netcafes go belly up because of it (really nice ones too).