Jennifer Irwin Entrepreneur

I am not clear on the best location to learn and understand the NY regulations, licenses and permits we will need to serve and sell preprared foods. How long do these take? We need a good business laywer to ensure we have the right insurances in place. If we could find a resource who had opened a NY State Farm Brewery that would be ideal, as we are currently investing in this space. We are actively evaluating various commerical properties in the Finger Lakes region surrounding Keuka Lake. We continue to contract and expand our thoughts on the range of offerings we would provide in our business based on possible location. IE one location would allow us to bring in revenue and cover the mortgage for the property, that was not associated with our primary business.

We have been actively researching the hops growing aspects for the longer term (year 2). We have made the decision to not open until 2023, but would be keen to open in Jan 2023, to allow us to work out the kinks prior to the tourist season. We have developed several iterations of our business plan, have family relocating May 1 from Utah to plan and help us run the business. We have had two set of friends offer to invest should we need it, however we are keen to self-fund. We are enrolled in the SBA WEDC Core Four Course which kicked off in Feb 2022.

1) Decision on business location Fall 2022 2) Determination on if we can self-fund Fall 2022. 3) Open with the BBQ Spring 2023. 4) Determine if our business model will support being open 5 or 6 days a week, and conceptually if we can close one month out of the year. 5) Determine what revenue/company growth would allow me to leave my full time job (operations executive) and leave corporate america in the next 8 to 9 years.

1) Validate our thoughts and assumptions from someone who has successfully done this before in NY state, or in a tourist environment in the last three to five years. 2) Understand the business risks we may not be aware of. 3) Understand things to consider about buying or renting commerical real estate. 4) Located / referrals to business lawyer, tax advisors.

We are starting a self funded family business in the finger lakes regions of NY State. As owners of a family farm, our first focus will be growing our own hops as we establish a NY Farm based brewery. The retail side of the business will be to open a road-side take out and casual eatery focused on our long view farms smokehouse barbecue, our craft made beers and casual gourmet delicatessen items. Our priority is establish this business around Keuka Lake, NY.