Webinar/Podcast
3 Essential Food Cost Controls For Independent Restaurants
It's very easy to lose lots of money working with food. Improper portioning, theft, cooking mistakes, spoilage and high product prices are just a few of the many problems that result in higher food cost and lower profitability.
In this program, we'll discuss 3 of the most effective practices and controls for independent restaurants that will reduce your food losses and improve your profitability.
NOTE: This is a very educational and valuable learning experience for chefs, kitchen managers and key kitchen employees in addition to other management personnel.
What You Will Learn:
- A weekly report that will make your kitchen personnel more responsive and accountable for controlling your food cost
- One practice that has helped many independents lower their food cost 7% to 10% virtually overnight
- Why better food cost practices can also improve your guest experience
- One practice you must implement immediately if you suspect employee theft
- Basic food management concepts and practices that all your managers and key kitchen personnel should know and understand
About the Presenters:
Jim Laube
Jim is the founder and CEO of RestaurantOwner.com. He has a diverse 30-year career in the restaurant industry that includes various staff positions, manager, controller, CPA and advisor to hundreds of independents throughout the U.S. and Canada. Jim is a popular restaurant industry speaker and seminar leader whose clients include the National Restaurant Association, Pizza Expo, SYSCO, Food Services of America, Gordon Foodservice, the New York Restaurant Association, Walt Disney and Papa John's.
Joe Erickson
Joe Erickson is the Chief Operations Officer and a partner in RestaurantOwner.com. He has owned and/or managed several restaurant/catering operations. He started his career by developing Luther's Catering, a division of the Luther's BBQ chain, in Houston. He was also a partner and co-founder of Sunset Dinner Cruises and was the founding partner of Bobby Mac's, a casual, full service restaurant in Kerrville. He later helped to develop a southwestern bistro, Nicole's Cafe San Felipe, and was managing partner for the original Truluck's Steak and Stone Crab, which now has 11 locations throughout the U.S. Joe is focused primarily on developing easy-to-implement, yet highly effective systems and processes to help our members improve their restaurants' efficiency, product utilization and most importantly, deliver a more consistent guest experience.
Download Slides:
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Inventory Count Sheet
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Restaurant Order Guide Form
An effective ordering system has added benefits that go beyond the simple goal of maintaining sufficient product to serve your guests. Proper ordering procedures also help to keep fresh product in stock and serves as a backup just in case the person doing the ordering isn't there.
Attendee Answers
| 1. What is your position/role? (1:40) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Owner - 30 | ||||
| GM/Operations Manager - 13 | ||||
| AGM/Chef - 7 | ||||
| Operations Manager - 3 | ||||
| CPA - 2 | ||||
| Cost Analyst - 2 | ||||
| Project Manager | ||||
| Loss prevention manager | ||||
| 2. Do you have a separate soft beverage category? (4:59) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yes - 57% of responses | ||||
| No - 43% of responses | ||||
| 3. Do you break out Food Cost into multiple categories? (6:12) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yes - 34% of responses | ||||
| No - 66% of responses | ||||
| 4. When you calculate Food Cost, do you take a 100% physical inventory? (7:37) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yes - 82% of responses | ||||
| No - 18% of responses | ||||
| 5. Is there anything else that you do to speed up physical inventory taking? (10:20) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shelf to sheet, making sure the sheet order reflects the order on shelves - 3 | ||||
| Reinhart offers a great program | ||||
| Toast has a great module | ||||
| Partender | ||||
| We use an app | ||||
| We're looking into companies that have phone apps | ||||
| Write weights on items when receiving them. Then full cases don't have to be weighed again. | ||||
| 6. In this example, would you prefer a food cost of 29% or 36%? (16:47) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 29% - 57% of responses | ||||
| 36% - 43% of responses | ||||
| 7. Do you know what your food cost was last week? (19:15) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yes - 71% of responses | ||||
| No - 29% of responses | ||||
| 8. Any other benefits of Weekly Food Costing? (20:45) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Less theft | ||||
| Help control purchasing | ||||
| Helps define pricing for other revenue streams | ||||
| Staff get excited about numbers | ||||
| We bonus on percentages so they have control over the results | ||||
| 8. What weekly cycle are you on? (25:03) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monday - Sunday - 18 | ||||
| Wednesday - Tuesday - 4 | ||||
| Friday - Thursday - 3 | ||||
| 9. What system/app/software do you use to do weekly Food/Prime Costing? (26:41) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Excel Spreadsheet - 4 | ||||
| Sysco App - 4 | ||||
| ChefTec - 3 | ||||
| Restaurant365 - 2 | ||||
| US Foods Online - 2 | ||||
| Averro - 2 | ||||
| RSI - 2 | ||||
| Orca Inventory - 2 | ||||
| Partender | ||||
| Upserve | ||||
| Northstar App | ||||
| Toast | ||||
| Toast | ||||
| Ctuit | ||||
| Compeat | ||||
| GetOrderly.com | ||||
| SSP | ||||
| 10. In this example, why is Food Cost going down? (37:17) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Less waste | ||||
| Lower purchases | ||||
| Better product utilization | ||||
| Keeping less on the shelf | ||||
| Better portioning | ||||
| Inventory control | ||||
| Better par levels | ||||
| 11. Do you count key products every day? How many? (48:11) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yes (Answers range between 3-5 products, some count all meat and seafood) - 15 | ||||
| No - 11 | ||||
| 12. Have you taken at least 1 course on the Learning System? (54:31) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yes - 92% of responses | ||||
| No - 8% of responses | ||||
