All Blog Posts Tagged 'costs' (23)

Commodity Costs are Likely to Rise in 2013. What can you do?

With the drought, rising beef prices and internation pressures, indicators point to food costs going up in 2012. Here is an interview with some suggestions on how to deal with rising costs.

"We are looking at a very difficult round of food commodity cost increases," says John Gordon, Principal of the Pacific Management Consulting Group. In a Foodservice Radio interview, John talks about the new drivers influencing food costs and what operators can do to help offset increases…

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Added by Bob Ryals on September 27, 2012 at 3:20pm — 1 Comment

Why Restaurants Go Broke - Understanding the Numbers

Shows the different cost factors that cause a restaurant or cafe to lose money and eventually fail.

Both variable and fixed costs are relevant, plus declining customer numbers and sales per head, but as you will see, excessive rent and loan commitments usually cause the most problems.

Added by Ken Burgin on June 10, 2012 at 4:47pm — No Comments

A Response to a Customer’s Concern

Q: I was in Georgetown Bagelry today and was unable to buy a fountain soda. What gives?

A: I apologize for the inconvenience. While I would love to have fountain soda in the bagel shop, it was a tough decision and one I couldn’t put off any longer. I was hoping to have a rush of capital to totally renovate, but since…

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Added by Mary Beall Adler on August 14, 2011 at 10:00am — No Comments

Non-Operator Start with the basics, the business basics...

Independant operating restaurants are constantly surprising me with their business operations. I would be interested in doing a research profile on how many of my customers actually do a monthly inventory (weekly?), track their labor costs related to sales (revenue/labour hour), or even understand their margins item to item.

This is a common theme among restaurant dreamers.

"I know how to cook & I have alot of friends & my husband can operate the foh because he…

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Added by Joel Lazeski on September 17, 2010 at 11:33am — No Comments

Non-Operator 20 steps to lowering your food or liquor costs

This article will be one of the most important I've ever written for restaurant owners and managers in other food services. In this article, I'm going to do something you won't see from another consultant. I'm going to share with you the exact steps of an action plan I created to help a restaurant create a food cost fitness program, along with some helpful commentary from me. These steps would be the same for liquor costs, but would focus on different employees in a different area of the… Continue

Added by Brandon O'Dell on June 3, 2010 at 7:27pm — No Comments

Labor Will Make or Break You

I have been thinking a lot recently about my own operation. How could I continue to find new opportunities to be more efficient and reduce expenses without affecting the guest? As most of you know, labor is our biggest expense; fixed labor is often a financial burden in slow times but necessary when busy. So how do you create the correct staffing model for your operation?

The first step is to look at it as an outsider. If you were critiquing someone else’s operation as a consultant,… Continue

Added by Chef Len Elias CEC on December 28, 2009 at 7:00am — 3 Comments

Milk Production Declines on the Way

The chart of the week is weekly dairy cow slaughter. This is an important statistic to monitor because it can indicate the trend in the size of the milk cow herd and thus milk production levels. Dairy cow slaughter for the week ending June 13th was 50% larger than the 5 year average for the week. Dairy cow slaughter has been trending well above last year’s inflated levels for about 7 consecutive weeks. Thus, we anticipate that a notable net reduction in the milk cow herd is likely to occur this… Continue

Added by David Maloni on June 25, 2009 at 2:33pm — No Comments

<b>Higer Quality Lower Cost?</b>

For me, these “times” have expanded the creative side of P&L management like never before. In the past, my thinking was somewhat linear when it came to food cost control- Portioning, Purchasing, Menu Pricing, & Waste Control. Now that we have entered into the Great Reset, I have had to change the way I go about thinking and doing things in my restaurant.

It was December of 07’ when I started to feel a little pain. Sales were trending down and I did not quite know why. At this… Continue

Added by Dan Parsons on June 5, 2009 at 6:08pm — 2 Comments

Easy Labor Management - 5 Tips to Better Employee Schedules and Higher Profits

Fingerprint scanners are delicate pieces of technology. Use them to clock in/out. Don’t use them to enter PINs. Restaurant and hospitality staff normally must enter a PIN / id into a Point of Sale system every few minutes, and with greasy hands, fingerprint scanners become defective quickly.

Employees who ride the clock are draining business profits. Monitor timesheets and schedules to effectively stop early clock ins. Better yet, use a labor management system that does… Continue

Added by Anthony Presley on May 8, 2009 at 9:46am — No Comments

Dairy Trade and Contracting

The chart of the week is US CME block cheese and International Cheddar markets. The principal reason cheese and butter prices were so inflated for the better parts of 2007 and 2008 was tight world supplies. This factor and the deflated dollar opened up literally a world of export business for US butter and cheese. Roughly 14% of US butter production was exported in 2008 compared to 6% in 2007 and 1.7% in 2006. Roughly 2.8% of US cheese production was exported in 2008 compared to 2.3% in 2007… Continue

Added by David Maloni on April 9, 2009 at 10:33am — No Comments

Non-Operator What can FOH staff do to help reduce food costs?

Much I have read about saving on food costs deals with purchasing and portioning.

What can FOH do to help reduce food costs?

I read that in restaurants there is about a 30% waste factor of food thrown out because diners don't eat the entire meal.

My experienced observation tells me that a number of wasted products could have been saved if the waiter had mentioned this option when taking orders., "Bye the way, our burgers come with tomatoes, lettuce, pickles,… Continue

Added by Paul Paz on March 16, 2009 at 10:12am — 3 Comments

What's the benefit of using a web application in my restaurant?

This is a follow up to my last post about the top 5 things that restaurants should be doing online. There are several good reasons for using online applications or software as a service (SaaS) as it's sometimes called.

Save Money - First, you'll have lower IT costs since you no longer need to employ people to worry about servers and software. Second, there are economies of scale at work.…

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Added by Jeff Schacher on January 27, 2009 at 7:45am — 5 Comments

Dairy Cows and Milk Prices

The chart of the week is Wisconsin Dairy Cow for Slaughter Prices.

As mentioned in previous issues of the Weekly Commodity Report and Daily Commodity Bulletin, depressed milk prices are pinching milk farmer margins. To put this in perspective, the February 2009 milk futures contract is currently trading well below $10. A year ago the February 2008 contract was trading at $17.00. Feed costs are lower, but not low enough to offset the… Continue

Added by David Maloni on January 16, 2009 at 6:31am — 2 Comments

How to combat rising food costs

According to the National Restaurant Association, food costs are one of the most important line items for a restaurateur. Research shows that food and beverage costs represent approximately 33 cents of every dollar in restaurant sales. The Association projects restaurateurs and other foodservice operators will buy $202.5 billion in food and drink from industry suppliers in 2008. It also predicts wholesale food costs and menu prices will continue to rise,… Continue

Added by Dani on October 20, 2008 at 5:49am — No Comments

Drive More Top Line Sales.....Or Cut Costs? Which Is Best?

Which is the smartest thing to do: generate more sales, or reduce operating costs?

Actually, the ideal is to do both simultaneously. The only way to make profits is to increase sales and reduce expenses…at the same time.

Naturally, when it comes to “marketing,” most people immediately think of generating sales; and that’s good. However, there are other aspects to marketing that can often be managed easier, better and result in the same goal—profits. It… Continue

Added by Roy MacNaughton on August 22, 2008 at 5:08pm — 2 Comments

The Protein Tipping Point

The chart of the week is US weekly sow slaughter. As I shared last week, broiler (chicken) egg sets have been in a decline during the past month and have fallen appreciably below year ago levels as chicken producers attempt to ration supplies in order to pressure chicken prices upward to account for the increase in feed costs. And as also as I shared last week, the chicken industry was not the only trade that was beginning to adjust production level plans. Hog producer margins, like the chicken… Continue

Added by David Maloni on May 8, 2008 at 11:38am — 1 Comment

Tabletop Lighting Increased Costs

Ok, now lets hear it.....the economy is uncertain, gas prices are rising, transportation costs are through the roof. And yes it has affected the restaurant business in more ways then one. Less customers, higher cost of supplies.....it is endless. Independent owner/operators probably feel the pinch the most. Our strategy has been to cut out the middle man and go direct.

Those… Continue

Added by Gary Strat on May 1, 2008 at 1:13pm — 5 Comments

Chicken Production and Supply Expectations

It’s no secret that chicken producers have been struggling with profitability attributed mostly to inflated feed costs. When profits are down for chicken suppliers, like any business, they need to reduce input costs or increase output prices. And the easiest way for chicken suppliers to boost output prices is to decrease the available supply. The chart of the week is the 6 week moving average for broiler (chicken) egg sets. We remember that a broiler egg is set roughly 10 weeks before being… Continue

Added by David Maloni on April 10, 2008 at 9:48am — 2 Comments

Non-Operator Drunken driver turns tables on restaurant

Patron hurt in 2006 crash sues former Trumbauersville bistro, claiming they allowed him to drink for too long.

By Scott Kraus | Of The Morning Call

February 28, 2008

It's not unusual for drunken drivers' victims or their families to sue the restaurant that served the drivers enough alcohol to put them over the legal limit.

But on Tuesday, a Bucks County man sued a defunct Trumbauersville restaurant for serving him alcohol that contributed to his own drunken… Continue

Added by Steve Gatt on February 29, 2008 at 8:38am — 1 Comment

Non-Operator Think your employees would never steal from you?

Caught on tape

Think your employees would never steal from you? Think again.

According to a 1999 study done by the National Restaurant Association, employee theft averages $218 per person each year. The average takeout and delivery pizzeria has 20 employees. The math says that’s $4,360 right out of your pocket annually. Worse yet, security experts call that estimate conservative. According to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, occupational fraud costs…

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Added by Steve Gatt on February 20, 2008 at 4:51am — No Comments