Restaurants rely on consistent food inventory to keep their operation running. However, food is costly, especially if you are in upscale dining with pricier ingredients. If you need help prioritizing your workflow, here is how restaurant management can reduce food costs.
Manage Your Inventory
The first aspect of a successful restaurant operation is attentive inventory management. While your customers only see the finished product, you must worry about the entire process—from acquisition to plating. Back-of-house functions enable your servers and hosts to cultivate a pleasant dining experience, so prioritize this behind-the-scenes work. When you know exactly how much you have of every item, you won’t overbuy or underbuy ingredients. Instead of blindly selecting when anticipating your needs, you should have an accurate accounting of your food to reference at a moment’s notice.
Avoid Spoiling Foods
Your inventory items eventually spoil, and you should know when to use them before decay. This rotten food equates to lost dollars since you bought the food and didn’t use it. While ordering your food may require a bit of educated guesswork, you should remain within your typical usage limits to reduce waste. It is better to tell a customer you ran out of salmon than to have spoiled fish in the back. They may not like having to pick another item from the menu, but they almost always will stay and order something new.
Plan Your Recipe and Menu Costs
Your food costs are directly related to the individual recipes and menu items you serve. You should cost plan each part of every dish to understand how much you spend when you make a dish. If you notice one item creates a cost deficit, you should rethink the ingredients you use to make it. Otherwise, you will lose money every time a customer orders that menu item.
Knowing how restaurant management can reduce food costs and actually doing it are two very different things. If you need help running your operation, consider adding restaurant POS equipment to your daily work. Our team at Business Software Solutions can help you find the technology you need to make your life easier.
