The "clotted cream and scones"-stuff is really the niche of the niche.
While there's little competition, the demand is minuscule - at best.
There's shop next to my place of work (called wabe3 - you can google them).
The sell honey-products from the City of Zurich and also some British stuff like scones etc.
Bought them once. Was OK-ish.
Also bought a small pot of honey. Was OK-ish, too. Might buy again.
But the honey I bought from the self-service booth of my local farmer was at least as good (and cheaper, much cheaper).
The trick is to find the right mixture between exotic vs. main-stream, exclusiveness, affordability, taste, desirability and (last but not least) calorie-count.
Even something that is truly to-die-for good will not sell well if it's too expensive and too calorie-rich (too much guilt-factor at once).
E.g. the Hug bakery next to my place of work makes a great Strawberry cake. It's great to the point that I could see myself eating it till I pass out.
But it's rather expensive for a small piece and yet looks and feels like even the tiny piece has more calories than a full meal...
The book club I belong to looked long and hard for a centrally (ish) located cafe where we could get together. I was surprised to find that there are few places where a group who would spend about 2 hours chatting would be welcome, despite that we met mid afternoons during what is generally slow time.
Sure, we were not ordering expensive meals - generally a couple of coffees and a desert apiece. But given that most restaurants are fairly empty at that time... In our search I came away with the impression it was not necessarily that we were not spending enough but rather that a group of 6 plus just didn't fit in with the normal clientele.
You might look for similar 'niche needs' if you find your business consistently has those in-between slow times. A full table bringing in something is generally better than an empty table bringing in nothing...
Funny, a friend and I had a very similar conversation a few years ago with a Swiss guy - he ridiculed UK food and made quite a show of it: "ughh, fish 'n' chips, ughh, pie, unhealthy, rubbish, yuck, yuck, plastic cheese, ughh". So, we turned the conversation around and asked him about Swiss delicacies: "hmm, so you have cheese soup, grated fried potato, potatoes drowned in molten cheese, etc, etc.". He capitulated rather rapidly.
Anyway, would love to see a cafe with real Danish bacon butties
That's a fair point - but almost certainly an order of magnitude greater than Danes!
Taking the other examples here - one of the reasons the UK (or US) have a wide range of food is that they aren't provincial. In the morning an average cafe may sell bacon butties, danish pastries, croissants and bagels - UK, DK, FR & US.
My last local lunchtime place in Scotland sold haggis, lasagne, curry, chilli and macaroni as their staples.
Swiss ones tend to sell gipfeli, mandelstange, nussgipfeli, wegeli... CH, CH, CH, CH. And bratwürst, rösti, fleischkäse, pizza for lunch.
Tillsamman on Sihlfeldstrasse is a Swedish cafe offering - amongst other things - bacon sandwiches for breakfast. Excellent coffee, too. Have a chat with them; they're very open.
Also with a food establishment you may require health and safety certification. The course I have found are only taught in German which makes it a bit difficult if your not a fluent speaker.
Hi there, I came across your reply to this thread recently.. & I was hoping I could stop by & pick your brains? :-D I tried to private message you, but wasn't apply too.
So please contact me instead. I look forward to hearing from you grumpygrapefruit!