PROTECTING THE BOTTOM LINE

Restaurant Financial Management for Operators Who Actually Run Restaurants

  • Fixed vs. Variable Expenses: How to Think About Your Restaurant’s Cost Structure

    Fixed vs. Variable Expenses: How to Think About Your Restaurant’s Cost Structure

    One of the most useful frameworks in restaurant financial management is also one of the most basic: the distinction between fixed expenses and variable expenses. It sounds like an accounting classification, and it is — but it is also a practical tool for understanding how your business performs under different sales conditions, where you have… Read more

  • Profit and Loss by Sales Channel: Not All Revenue Is Created Equal

    Profit and Loss by Sales Channel: Not All Revenue Is Created Equal

    A restaurant’s P&L typically presents revenue as a single line: net sales. That aggregation is useful for understanding the overall financial picture, but it conceals something important — the margin profile of different revenue streams can vary enormously, and a restaurant that does not understand its profitability by sales channel may be enthusiastically growing its… Read more

  • Labor Targets: Why You Need a Number Before the Week Starts

    Labor Targets: Why You Need a Number Before the Week Starts

    Managing labor in a restaurant without a target is like running a kitchen without a recipe. You might produce something edible, but you are unlikely to produce something consistent, cost-effective, and repeatable at scale. Labor targets — specific, pre-established benchmarks for what labor should cost in a given period — are the mechanism that transforms… Read more