HUMBOLDT — Seeing an opportunity, an entrepreneur has opened a new convenience store in Humboldt.
AlfaPlus is located on Eighth Avenue next to Red Swan Pizza and Spotlight Sport & Corporate Wear Ltd.
Parampreet Singh, AlfaPlus’ owner, said that he found the convenience store front on Humboldt to be lacking in numbers, and when the location opened up it was an obvious choice for him.
“It’s been pretty exciting and nervous at the same time. It took a lot of risk and willpower to get it started, thinking about it and how it’s going to work. But when we saw the response of people, they said they wanted it,” Singh said.
“They said it’s been way easier for them now, especially in the winter time, they don’t want to walk [far], they can just come here for the convenience.”
Before opening the store, Singh worked for two years at Tim Hortons, and about three years at a convenience store in Lanigan.
Singh said that finding a unique convenience store name was a challenge in itself, with the final choice taking about a month to decide on.
“We tried one name, and it wasn’t available, then we tried a second one and then there were a bunch of different options,” he said. “Alpha is just kind of the same as ‘one’ or like that. We thought it was different, something unique, then ‘plus’.”
On the store’s first day of business on March 2, Singh estimated they had about 50 to 70 customers – but his goal is to reach a minimum 100 to 150 each day.
“It’s a new business, we know it’s going to take time for people to come in,” he said. “We started advertising and we’re also providing free ice cream for now; just one scoop on a regular cone whenever anyone wants to come in whether they want to buy something or not.”
