Hi, I'm Britney Saunders and welcome to Big Business, the place where business is far from boring. And today I'm recording on gaddigul Land. Now I somehow manage to build an empire from the garage underneath my house and I'm here to share it all with you, from the winds, the huge mistakes, the challenging times and the funny moments
in between. So, whether you're in business already, perhaps you're not in the game at all, Maybe you're looking for some inspiration, or you simply want to hear the tea, this is the podcast for you now. Coming up on today's episode, I'm spilling the tea. It's the tea that everyone has been waiting for. So, as a lot of you would know, for the last four or so months, I have been working.
On Fate Adelaide and boy oh boy.
Do I have some updates and to just get straight to the chase, to just cut straight through. This Adelaide store that we've been working on for four to five months now is not going ahead.
The pin has been pulled. What are you going to say, Xander?
He's swung his microphone over to him.
Hello, I have not been on the pod for a few weeks. I've had some off time, so off.
Now you're back.
Yet now I'm back. Why what's going on?
I'm going to tell you exactly why.
You have a lot of Adelaide loyals. I know you are going to be screaming up a.
Store over there.
I will say, though, Okay, I'm going to tell you exactly what has happened. But I don't want everyone to think that this is me just giving up on Adelaide altogether.
Like it doesn't mean I'm giving up on Adelaide.
It just means this one store that we thought was going to be our store isn't going to be.
And there's so many good lessons in this.
And I love talking about this stuff because it's a good reminder not only to me and not only to my fellow business owners or aspiring business owners, but it's a good reminder, especially to our community, that it's not easy to just open a store when you want to open one. And I know I've said that a million times before. If someone's like, open a store and camera, I'm like, all right, give me twelve months and I will see if I can make it happen.
I will see what I can do.
Is this the first time that you've worked on a store this long to try and get it happen that it hasn't worked out.
Yeah, so this is the first time experiencing this. Every other store that we have pursued, it's happened, it's happened. But I'm a firm believer in everything happening for a reason. That's why my business is called Fate, And I think all of this has happened definitely for a reason.
So let's just get into.
It and tell you why the store that we had in mind and they've been working on for so many months now is not going ahead. My whole idea for our Adelaide boutique was that we wanted to do something a little bit different, And I've always had this vision of a Fate store being in a house. You know how you see those little cottage boutique cute houses, but it's like a business. Sometimes it's more like a beauty salon or whatever. But I've seen clothing stores that's in
a cute to little house. That was kind of the vision for Adelaide. Because Adelaide has a lot of like shopping area that do have like a mix of like actual shopfronts.
But then there's like the house on the corner kind of thing.
So that was kind of the inspiration for Adelaide, this cute little house, and we were going to call it like the Fate House or something. So I stumbled across this one cute spot and I saw it online. And I'll tell you what, Like every time we've opened a boutique store, every time I've seen it.
I know straight away, like when I'm just looking at it online.
And when you're looking at commercial real estate online, it's the same as when you're looking at residential. You know, you go to commercial real estate dot com the same way you go to like domain and real estate dot com, but you can.
Go and look at businesses.
So I was just searching Adelaide and I found this cute house and I thought, yep, I fucking love the look of that, Like it looks great. The other thing is like, there's so much criteria that I require for
a Fate store. It's got to be a certain size, So we need like minimum I don't even want to say one hundred and fifty square meters is big enough, Like we need more like two hundred square meters of space, and people always when I'm talking about opening a store, they're like, oh, you should rent this, and they sent me a link. It's like eighty square meters. It's like, I need so much more space than that. It's got to be the exact size for us. We can't just
move into any shop that's any size. So I found this shop, well, this house thing, and I loved it, so I back. I don't know what it was June Jelira August. I booked flights for April and I to go down and visit the site, because that's what you do, you go and inspect it, like you go and inspect
a house. So we walked through instantly, fell in love with it, loved the street that it was on, in like a little shopping street kind of thing on a corner, lots of other businesses around, lots of other clothing stores around, cafes, coffee.
Shops, jewelry shop across the road. I thought this was perfect.
So once you view us a space, then I had our builder. So we work with the same building company for all of our Fate stores, and they're not based in Adelaide, but they are all around Astrata. So then our builder went down to Adelaide after I had been to do their own site visit kind of thing, and they look at things like differently to the way I would. I guess like they look at it from a builder's perspective.
Then I went into some negotiation with the real estate agent because when I've said this before, and I'll always say it, like everything's negotiable, Like you can negotiate the rent. You can say I want this much rent free period, like I want to move in and not pay rent for three months or however long. I want the landlord to contribute to the fit out, and you can get all this kind of stuff when you do a commercial lease, like you can you can negotiate, and it's just up
to the landlord what they're willing to give you. Because commercial lease is a five years long, so they're going to want to invest in you a little bit because you're going to be with them for so long kind of thing. So I did a couple of months of negotiation, and I got to the point where I was absolutely happy with everything.
I was happy with the rent price.
We were going to not knock out walls on the inside, but we're just going to do some like cutouts to make some more or walkways, because it's like a house like you walk through and it's like a hallway and then there's like all bedrooms off to the side. So we got permission off the landlord to create some cutouts just to open up those rooms a little bit, so the doorways weren't like a single doorway.
So we got permission to do all of that.
Our builders like mocked it all up to kind of show, and we got approval off the landlord that he was happy for us to do that. We went through and checked that the property wasn't heritage listed because it's like.
An old cottage kind of home.
You got to check that kind of stuff because some people have gotten into scenarios where they are opening a store in like a heritage building and they go to start cutting out walls and then oh, hang on, it's heritage listed. You can't and that would be fucked. So that was all good. And then another thing which I had to do was I had to submit a da das you have to do even if you're like renovating your house, you have to put it through the council so that they know what you're doing kind of thing.
So I had to submit DA through the city of only because that's a suburb that it was in. Because with commercial buildings they are listed under a certain type of usage. So let's say, for example, this one that we were going for and was going to be our store, it was currently listed as like medical and reception and consulting.
So if you're a medical, reception or consulting business, you could move straight in there, and it's fine because the council knows that that's what it's like, it's operating as a medical or a reception or whatever. But for us, we need the council usage to be retail. So if any of you have ever dealt with councils and das, like it's a fuck around, as you can imagine, you've
got to give them like your left arm basically. Like anyway, so I started the DA process ages ago to get it switched from the medical into a retail, which like you can always do. It's just like you've got to jump through hoops and give them this proof and that and architect drawing and blah blah blah blah blah, like all that boring shit. So anyway, I started the process of that, and I kept the real estate agent in the loop that I was going through my DA process
and speaking with the council City of Only Plans, South Australia. Anyway, I got the lease. So this is months months in, like three months in I got the lease. Now this is my big lesson for anyone out there. I don't care if it's your first commercial lease or this was going to be out eighth, because we've got seven commercial leases at the moment right, so this is my first fucking rodeo.
It doesn't matter what it is.
If you're going into signing something, get a professional to read it. So I have a solicitor who reads all of our commercial leases. Every single time I have gotten the commercial lease and I'm like interested in a property, I send it to my solicitor and I say, hey, we're looking to open another store.
Here is our commercial lease.
Can you please go through it, and like that's his job, Like here's a solicitor that's like specializes.
In commercial leasing.
So they go through it, and it's worth every penny to pay someone to look at it because they read the fine print and can find like if there's anything sneaky being put.
In there or whatever.
So we do that every time, and every time he usually will come back like he did the Paramatta one, and he'll be like, just as long as you're happy to do this, which is in section three two A, and you're happy to do that, then this looks.
All good to me kind of thing.
So I send it over to our solicitor as usual, expecting him to come back as he usually does and just says like, this all looks good to me. But I just thought I would flag this, this and that, and usually they're things that I'm happy with anyway. But there was one clause in the lease that he flagged, and it also didn't sit right with AJ and I. So we have seven commercial leasas already, so we know what they're like. But this clause that we saw in
this lease in particular, we'd never seen before. So when you're signing commer lease, most of the time they're five years. My first bit of advice for anyone out there, if you're going into your first ever commercial lease, try and negotiate that down because five years is a really long time in business. Most businesses don't make it to five years, so don't sign something that long if you're not one
hundred percent confident in your business. Obviously, I'm confident in my business, so I have no worries at all signing a five year lease. That's a scary thing about opening stores, And that's a scary thing that I think about as well. When people say to me opening Canberra, I'm like, are you still going on a shop there in four and a half years, because I'm going to be there five.
You know.
But anyway, in any standard commercial lease, much like a home lease as well, if in the five year term we decide that we want to move out of there for whatever reason, like we need to move into a bigger shop, or we want to expand, or maybe the business has failed. If you break any commercial lease and let's say we break it three years in with two years remaining, just like if you moved out of a house, you have to find another tenant to take over that
last bit of the lease. I'm fine with that. That is in all of our commercial leases. So the landlord had that clause in there, which I was fine with. Sure, for whatever reason we have to leave, I will find another tenant. I've already done that once before with our last warehouse. When we moved out, there was still like a year or two left, we work with the real estate agent to find another business to take over.
But here's the kicker.
The landlord had in there, and it's fucked up the landlord had in there. If that happened and we had to move out for any reason in that five year term, and we then found another tenant to take over the remaining two years, three years, however many years, and then once we walked away, if that other business that took over the lease failed to pay their rent, I would be financially responsible.
What Yeah, that is wild?
Yeah?
Is that like? Is that legal?
So my solicitor was like gobsmacked at this because he specializes in commercial leases, and he said, I have never seen this clause because it's like you can't turn your back and walk away.
Like yeah, it's like you're still locked in.
You're locked in.
Yeah, you're actually responsible for another business's financial.
Yes, and so like he presented that to me and I was like, Okay, what the fuck? And then I was thinking, like more from my positive like my mindset that I always try and have. I was like, well, like age and I were trying to like figure out if it was worth worrying about or not, like because I said, this is a worst case scenario topped on top of another worst case scenario. Worst case scenario number one is being that we would sign a lease and
ever have to leave in the five years. Like that happening would be a worst case scenario for me, Like I hope that every shop that I have at the moment, I'm going to do the whole five years. It would be terrible if like we failed and had to you know, break the least kind of thing. So that's a number
one worst case scenario. But then the second worst case scenario piled on top of that first one happening is that I find another business and like they're not a genuine business or like they fall short on their rent.
Kind of thing.
Because you know, like we've already had someone take over our warehouse lease and they're.
Fine, Like they business is fine and they're paying their rent.
But like a business could come in there, know that clause exists and be like, well we can't pay so like stuff exactly have to pay for it.
Very weird.
And so my solicitor said, like, I've never seen this, and he tried to do a bit of research, and I think that clause and I don't take my word for this, Like.
Allegedly, I think it's illegal in like New.
South Wales and Victoria to have that clause in there, but I think, like, because each state is different, so I think in Adelaide or South Australia, this kind of clause is okay to have.
So anyway, like all.
Things are negotiable, And this is what you do when you're working out a commercial lease is you go back and say, like, I want this changed, I want that taken out, Like you can negotiate in that way, mind you, Like this is like at the three month mark that we've been like working with this agent and the landlord. So I went back and said, look, I'm happy with
fucking everything. And as you know, i'm working with the council and we're going through the DA like my builder is engaged, like we're ready to sign the dotted line, but that one clause seventeen point one, whatever the fuck it was, I'm not comfortable with that. And so he said, all right, let me cause the agents are just the middleman. Like they're just the middleman. So he's like, let me take it to the landlord and come back to you.
So like another week goes by, Hey, Brittany, the landlord doesn't want to move on that clause, and then again.
Like I go back to AJ.
We have more conversations, and then so we sat on it again. I was like, maybe we can just hope that that would never happen, Like that's the worst case scenario that we would fail and have to move out, and then the worst case scenario that a bad business would go in and fail on there. But something in the back of my mind was like this morally doesn't feel right. I went back again for a second time and said, look, can you ask him again, like can
he take it out? And so I waited again and again came back, No, he doesn't want to take it out. The day before our Paramatta store opening, so it was a Tuesday, I was in our Paramatter store getting it ready. AJ and I'd been having so much back and forth, like I'm working with the counsel, I'm doing all this shit. Mind you, I've ordered all the stock. I've ordered all the stock for Adelaide because you have to because stock.
Takes like fucking six months.
So and like the good thing about that is like we're in such a fortunate position where all that stock I've ordered for Adelaide if I don't find another store in that time, I've just ordered all of our best sellers, which I can just spread out amongst all of our stores, like it's only one store's worth. I can spread it across our five other stores and they would just have a little mini restock. But I'm in a fortunate position
to be able to do that. Imagine if I wasn't and I'd committed to spending this few hundred thousand dollars on stock and I had nowhere else to sell it.
So thank God for that.
So anyway, the day before our paramount opening, I just sent like a very strong and powerful email to the agent mind you, like he would want us in there because he's been dealing with us for months, like they're not looking at any other tenants. Actually, let me read it out for the sake of the drama. So here
is the email that I sent. And I really want to breafasce this by saying, I one hundred percent respect the reason that the landlord may have this in his contract, like landlords can put whatever they want in their contracts. And I talk about this a little bit in this email, but I don't want anyone to think this is me like shaming the fucking landlord or the real estate agent. This is literally business, and this is a shit that happens. So my email on the twelfth of November was hey,
real estate's name, thanks for getting back to me. I completely understand the landlord's concerns surrounding this entire possible scenario, and perhaps he has been burnt in the past, and maybe that's the reason why he has this clause in his contracts, Because I'm just thinking, like, maybe this guy's been really fucked over and in that scenario before, and maybe that's why it's now in all of his commercial leases, which if so fair enough, I thought i'd mention he
would have to oh, because he was saying something about like how he was worried about like the new tenant coming in, so I said I thought i'd mentioned he would have to approve the tenant if we were to ever need to break the lease. It wouldn't be like I'd be having a complete random taking over the lease. In saying this, I still completely understand his concerns. After a lot of thought, I regretfully will not be moving forward with commencing our lease at this location. Then I
did a little pitch about us. We have seven commercial leases within our business, all of them being five years, and some I've even renewed already. Within those seven leases, none of them have this clause in place.
I want to.
Express that I have full confidence in our business. Our business and retail stores are absolutely thriving, and I can only be sure that if we were to take out the lease at this location, we'd be signing the five year option through a very successful first five years. Because just like side note, when you sign a lease, you get like a five year within a five year option, so then it's up to you if you want to
take the next five years. It's not like you get to the end of the five years and they go, oh, well see y'all, Like it's the ball is in your court when you have that option. My reason for not moving forward any further is simply because it feels morally wrong for this clause to be in the contract. If the owner changes his mind at all, I will be right here waiting. As I have mentioned, we love the location.
Our builders are engaged for the project. We have the town planner and draftsmen ready to go with getting the drawings done. Unfortunately, this one clause just doesn't sit right with me, even though it's almost certain it's something we would most likely never have to worry about. The fact that it's in there just doesn't feel right. Thanks for your understanding. And I sent that and I was like.
Boom, did you get a response?
I did.
Do you get a response that included the landlord's response?
No?
Not really, So I got a response the same day. Hi, Brittany, I will need to discuss with the landlord and come back to you. So when I sent that email, I thought, this is his opportunity to go, Okay, fuck it fine, like we're taking the claws out. And like I said in that email, like this clause, like if we were to just take the lease anyway and move in, we probably never have to worry about it, like touch would.
We'd have a successful five years and just never have to worry about it and it wouldn't even matter anyway. But it's the fact that it was in there that
just didn't sit right with me. And you know, I was calling my friends who owned businesses and weighed one of my good friends for over ten years, he's like, fuck it, like he was trying to be more like optimistic and like Brittany, Like if it was anyone else, I'd be worried, but it's you, like just take it like you're going to be in there for the five years. But I don't know, just the fact that it's in
there and it's not in any about other ones. It just didn't feel right, and I'm like, I don't know if this is one thing that's in there, like is something else going to pop up in the future.
Who I mean, We've had discussions about contracts I've dealt with in my performing life, and there's certain things that I haven't been comfortable with that I've told you about. And you're, like, you said to me, if it doesn't feel right, exactly, go ahead with you.
Yeah, if there's something and like this is the other thing too, Like this is just something that's making me feel a certain type of way before I even got the keys, you know, so I may I.
Would have that gut feeling lingering there the whole time you were there. Yeah, And to be quite honest, that kind of stuff it seeps into everything else.
Yeah.
So he came back to me that same day and said, because I was like done, like I'm done, I wrote in there. You know, if he changes his mind, I'm right here waiting because I knew they weren't talking to anyone else.
I've been dealing with me for three to.
Four months by this point, and I got that email back and I was like, here we go, Here we go. He's gonna fucking turn it around. I was like, perfect, I've got what I wanted. But he came back again like the next day and said, unfortunately, you know, he's not gonna move on it.
And I went back again.
I said, I completely respect whatever the reason is that he has that in there, And like I said to the real estate agent, we might chat again soon, like if I find another property that catches my eye and that's it, Like that's the end of the journey. And I think it's just such a I'm hoping that my community, like our fake community, is listening to this, because like people see us open a store and just think, like it's so easy. And I have a whole other episode
on opening a store. I think, if you want to find it, it's called like why it costs five hundred grand.
To open a store?
I believe it is called.
That something like that. Take a scroll back and you'll find it.
And in that episode, I outline every single cost that it costs open a store, and it costs half a million dollars at least to open one, and that's not including all this shit that I've just done for the last three to four months. Like not only is it a half a million dollar investment and I need to have that money available to pay.
But then there's all this.
It's not easy, and it's not like our community's always like open here.
Open Goalco has opened down.
And open Kasmania, open camera, Like it takes so long and stuff like this can happen, Like you can think that it's going ahead like I have been. The stock is ordered, fucking we already planned that we're opening it in February, but then stuff like this can happen. Boom, the whole thing's gone. But that again is business, and like it's not easy, Like if it was easy, everyone would be doing it, and if it was easy and cheap,
I'd be opening up stores left, right and center. But like this whole thing is a journey, Like business is a fucking journey.
What do you have to say looking into the future now, is your site still set on Adelaide, like is there plan? Are you still looking now? Is their plans to still open a store, and that I.
Would absolutely love to because I know how excited everyone was when I started sharing that I was going to look at a property in Adelaide. And that's another thing I wanted to mention as well, like I don't feel any regrets about like sharing us going down there on social media because like with my social media and my podcast here, like I want.
To share what it's like to run out of the journey. Yeah, I'm gonna make.
A video because everyone's like, what's the update, So I'm gonna make an update. And I've already been filming footage because we have this really exciting plan I'll tell it on here. So I've been filming landscape videos of this whole journey, like instead of like your long skinny, we've been turning the phone sideways because so far, yeah, we've been turning the phone sideways because what we were going to do with this store. But I guess we'll still keep the footage and maybe use it if we ever
do open an Adelaide's store eventually. Is we were gonna make a movie and then hire out a movie theater and our community could come and watch the whole movie of the store process.
That's so cool.
And so I've got all this footage now that I'm like putting on hold. But this is business, like, this is what I do, and this is what I want to educate people about. And I have no shame that I got everyone a bit excited about Adelaide and now I'm going to disappoint them because that's the reality of running a business. Nothing is ever going to go exactly how you want it to. In fact, you have to be willing to roll with the fact that shit's probably never going to go exactly the way that you want
it to. You just have to be ready to change directions. So as for us moving forward, absolutely, I'd still love to open a store in Adelaide. I've already been looking online and I've been talking to people, but I mean, it's getting really late in the year, so I feel like it's something that I'm going to put to rest for this year, like it's been a big year and I'll kick up our journey again at the start of next year. So that, my friends, is why Fate Adelaide
isn't going ahead for now. It's not to say that it won't in the future. And I really want to stress that I'm not making this episode to like spill the tea on the landlord and the agent.
I respect for whatever reason. We love it.
Yeah, I respect for whatever reason that they have that clause in the contract. And it's a very good lesson for everyone out there. Read those contracts. I don't care what it is that you're signing. I don't care if it's something in your personal life or anything. Read those contracts,
read the fine print and find things like this. And that's why I always put leases through our solicitor, because he like notices these little things that I'd maybe just skim over and be like, like, if he never brought that to my attention, I probably would have read that and when yeah, but that's fine, Like that's never gonna happen anyway. But then he was the one that kind of said to me, look, are you really comfortable with that?
So yeah, that's the story on Fate Adelaide. It's really sad because it was such a beautiful shop and it had like twelve car parks out the back, like it's just fucking perfect.
But it is what it is.
And again, like business is how you respond and move forward. I could be completely disheartened by this and saying.
I'm never opening anilade ever again.
Fuck fuck them, But you know, the show must go on as always and stay tuned and maybe I'll you know what, maybe the next door that I'll find would be even better, because everything happens for a reason, and fate is fate for a reason. So that's my update and my tip of the week to end the episode is I've already said it.
Read your fucking contracts. Read your contracts.
I don't care if it's a one page thing, a two page thing, or a fifty page thing. Your bloody contracts.
And don't be scared to stand your ground.
Yes, negotiate, stand your ground, do what you got to do. Everything's negotiable in life and in business.