Category: Expenses
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Restaurant Inventory Management: The Weekly Habit That Saves Thousands
Most restaurant operators know their food cost percentage. Fewer know exactly where that number comes from week to week. The answer is inventory — and the operators who count it consistently, accurately, and on a fixed schedule are the ones who actually control their margins instead of just reporting them…
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What Percentage Should Labor Cost Be in a Restaurant?
What percentage should labor cost be in a restaurant? Target benchmarks by concept, what counts as fully loaded labor, and why you should track SPLH alongside the percentage.
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How to Lower Food Cost in a Restaurant
How to lower restaurant food cost: the five levers that move it — purchasing, portioning, waste, menu mix, and weekly tracking — plus target benchmarks.
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Restaurant Cash Flow Forecast Template: Never Run Out of Cash Again
Every year, thousands of restaurants close not because they are unprofitable, but because they run out of cash. The P&L says the business is making money. The bank account says otherwise. And by the time the operator realizes there is a gap between those two realities, it is often too…
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Restaurant Labor Cost Template: Track Every Dollar You Spend on Staff
Labor is the largest controllable expense in almost every restaurant. It is also the one most operators track badly — if they track it at all beyond glancing at the weekly payroll number and hoping it looks right. The problem is not that operators ignore labor cost. The problem is…
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Managing Credit Card Fees for Better Restaurant Profit
Credit card processing fees are one of the most consistent and most overlooked expenses in the restaurant industry. They are not glamorous. They do not come with a vendor rep who calls to check in, a line item that management reviews at weekly meetings, or an obvious lever you can…
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Plateware Cost and Quality: The Investment That Shapes Guest Perception
Plateware — the plates, bowls, glasses, and serving vessels that carry the food and beverage to the table — is one of the few restaurant investments that simultaneously affects the guest experience, the kitchen’s ability to execute, and the financial model in ways that compound over time. It is also…
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Customer Acquisition Cost in Restaurants: What It Really Costs to Get a New Guest
Customer acquisition cost — the total marketing and promotional spend required to bring one new guest through the door — is a metric that software companies track obsessively and most restaurant operators have never calculated. This is not because the concept is irrelevant to restaurants. It is because the restaurant…
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Uniforms in Restaurants: The Hidden Cost and the Branding Opportunity
Uniforms occupy an interesting position in restaurant financials: they are small enough as an individual line item to be overlooked, but large enough in aggregate — and important enough to brand and guest experience — to deserve deliberate management. For a full-service restaurant with 30 hourly employees, a poorly managed…
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Restaurant Marketing on a Budget: What Actually Drives Traffic
Marketing budgets in independent restaurants are typically small — 1 to 3 percent of net sales is the typical range, which on a $1.2 million restaurant is $12,000 to $36,000 per year. That is not a lot of money relative to what a meaningful brand-awareness campaign would cost in a…