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[H677]Hotel And Restaurant Industry

by Mario Churchill, Mar

One very important fact about the restaurant industry, is the fact that you absolutely need to keep consistent portion control. Ingredients are purchased in weight, count and volume. You will need to calculate the cost of all ingredients in a recipe. Total the costs and divide this by the food cost you want to charge for a menu item. This way you will have a price for your menu for this item.

In the restaurant industry, you will need to count all ingredients. As an example, a cheese burger with tomato, lettuce, and mustard on a wheat bun with a small bag of potato chips has a total cost of $2.10. If you want to get a 30% food cost for this item, you will need to divide $2.10 by 30 % (.30), which will give a menu price of $7.

Try to keep your food costs between 22 and 34%. If your food cost is 22%, it will mean you will be spending 22 cents of every dollar for food. This would leave you 88% of every dollar to cover labor and other expenses.

If you want to use the factoring method, you can multiply the cost of ingredients by three. This will only give you the cost of the menu item and not include other costs.

When you use gross margin pricing, the formula is profit minus the cost of goods sold divided by the net sales. For instance a gross profit margin of 33:1 means that for every sales dollar, you will have 33 cents to cover other expenses. This is the best for calculating a dish with a high ingredient cost in the restaurant industry.

The Prime Cost method works by adding the cost of labor and cost of food, then add a percentage for profit. This method is good in the restaurant industry for dishes that need a lot of preparation.

Competitive Pricing matches what other restaurants charge for the same product, with what you charge. Compare the prices by studying the menus, and price your product not much higher or lower than what others are charging.

The restaurant industry views combination pricing as a method that uses all methods? factoring, gross margin, prime costs, and competition. They try to balance prices of the competition with your costs and what you need to make.

ChefTec Software? will allow you to customize reports and print out inventory reports, recipes, make up ordering lists and analyze recipe and menu costs by portion.

PC-Food II? Is an inventory and marginal management system for use in all food service establishments. You can calculate and keep food costs down, and keep track of selling prices based on the margin you desire. You can generate displays and reports, export files. You can use already programmed recipes, or add your own recipes to the list and generate them whenever you want them. This and so much more is available on this software.

You will find plenty of restaurant software on the internet.

What do these hospitality industry giants have in common? Technology. From point-of-sales (POS) and table-management software to wireless headsets, and SMS-enabled tracking systems, technology has become the key to success in the restaurant industry. No matter their size - whether a small, family-owned independent or a large dine-in chain - every restaurant will need to make use of enabling technologies to remain competitive in Britain's growing restaurant market.

Benefits of Restaurant Technology Clear

The leading chain restaurants have been taking the lead as early adopters of technological solutions to traditional industry related challenges, such as improving productivity, reducing labor costs, and maximizing sales. In particular, the fast-service chains have focused on meeting the ever-growing consumer demand for convenience and value by using technology to deliver better value and passing the savings on to customers. Fifty percent of quick-service operators plan to make even greater investments in technology over the period ahead.

Most recently, technological applications are being used to help restaurateurs streamline ordering, reduce ticket times, shore up inventory control, and perfect kitchen organization, while improving accuracy at every stage of the order-to-table process.

Tapping Into Your Target Market

In this respect, many owners of takeaway restaurants are turning to the power of the Internet. For example, Domino's Pizza has realized a 42 percent increase in online ordering over the past 12 months. The trend toward Web-enabled online ordering systems promises to help many restaurants rapidly expand their customer bases, while realizing significant savings in marketing costs. Approximately 30 million people, or roughly 57 percent of UK households, have access to the Internet.

Other innovative restaurateurs are adopting systems that enable customer to place pick-up and delivery orders via text-messaging. At the fore of such systems are integrated solutions that combine the power of wireless services to track orders from receipt, through the entire preparation and delivery process to the customer's front door.

Why Your Restaurant Business N-E-E-D-S a POS System and SMS Printer

The SMS printer is unique in that, unlike PCs for online ordering or fax machines, it may be placed right in the kitchen. All the unit needs is a power outlet, as it operates on the mobile phone network. Staff need not run to check for online or faxed orders every 5 minutes – they are printed instantly on the cooking line.

POS technology is also having big impact across all sectors of the hospitality industry. Some early adopters have reported a pick-up in service speed of 20 to 30 percent. Moreover, these systems make the orders easier to read and transmit through the kitchen and preparation process, while leaving critical wait staff on the floor.

These systems also eliminate mistakes and miscommunications, which also contribute to speed and service - perhaps the two most crucial commodities in the restaurant industry. Using POS and an SMS printer together, any establishment can organize and streamline in-house, takeaway and delivery order processing inexpensively and effortlessly.

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About Author

Both Mario Churchill & Oliver Lewis are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.

Mario Churchill has sinced written about articles on various topics from Credit Cards, Anger Control and Credit Cards. Mario Churchill is a freelance author and has written over 200 articles on various subjects. For more information on checkout his recommended websites. Mario Churchill's top article generates over 246000 views. to your Favourites.

Oliver Lewis has sinced written about articles on various topics from Computers and The Internet, Text Messaging and Marketing and Communications. Oliver Lewis develops systems and software to help fast-food and take-away restaurants succeed at online businesses. Find out more about how to incorporate the new. Oliver Lewis's top article generates over 9900 views. to your Favourites.