Equipment Layout-

The layout of kitchen and other equipment in food service businesses, the number and location of required sinks and other items by the Health Department, etc., can also have a strong influence on what is or isn't a workable design.  And since space is always at a premium, accuracy can be very important.  I have been handed kitchen equipment plans drawn up by the people selling the equipment only to find out an inch or two off here or there in the actual specifications of the listed equipment (not to mention the lack of accommodating ADA requirements) added up to a kitchen that had to be completely re-designed.  I would caution you against "free" design services from these companies.

Exiting & Paths of Travel-

There are too many fire exiting and path of travel codes  to cover fully in this short article, I just want to inform you here that they exist and are important to your design.  In new commercial spaces, this has generally been addressed in the original permit drawings, but the design of your interior space and the type of business you are running there can easily alter the required number, size, and maximum separation distance of the required exits.

Parking-

A common misconception, especially (but not limited to), new commercial spaces is that the parking requirements of already been met by the permit on the original building.  In a general sense this is true, but parking requirements are different for different kinds of businesses. As spaces fill up in a new building, or there is a change in the type of business being housed in an existing building, changes to the parking requirements outside of the building may either have to be made, or your business may not be allowed in that space due to lack of parking.

The planning departments make a general assessment of required parking for a new building or complex of buildings but base this on assumptions that may not play out in the actual businesses that end up occupying the spaces.  So, be sure early on that parking is available for your proposed project before getting too deep into the design and/or plans for your project.

See my article "But We Got it in Writing!" on the nightmare stories page for a cautionary tale about this issue.

Conclusion-

These are just a few of the most common issues I run into with new commercial clients and by no means is this a complete list of issues you may have to contend with.  But I hope at least providing a few of these most common ones will help smooth out what can be a very rough path if you are not aware of them, or have misconceptions about them.  But don't let any of this scare you off, just go into your project with your eyes open about some of these fundamental subjects of commercial tenant improvement design.

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