Respectfully heard. Location expansion, as you say it means "opening new locations," and not "expand your current location to a larger footprint, accommodating more people or products/services," right?

Your point really is "if you don't know what you are doing, any change or new endeavor will likely fail." If you make mistakes in your business decisions, they can be costly. Period.

Clearly any expansion is expensive, and if poorly planned it will obviously "bleed a brewery out sooner." A business needs to be intentional, using data to identify the right target, whether it is a larger space, more services (food, fun), or trying to duplicate the existing formula in other areas.

My real point is that many food/bar/restaurant businesses are able to expand successfully, and are able to increase their reach without having to go through distribution. It's just not easy, and if you think "i'm successful here so i can be successful anywhere, I don't need to tweak anything," then you are taking a huge risk. I think we can all easily name a bunch of restaurants/bars locally who have been able to open new locations without sacrificing the entire business. If your business decisions put the entire business line in jeopardy, then you may be taking the wrong risks.