Restaurant bookkeeping, done weekly, read monthly.
A restaurant generates more transactions in a week than most small businesses do in a quarter. Left to the end of the quarter, it becomes a reconstruction job, and reconstruction tells you nothing you can use.
The weekly rhythm
- Takings. POS to bank, every day accounted for, card settlements matched net of fees.
- Suppliers. Bills in as they arrive, coded by category, so food cost is a real number rather than an estimate.
- Payroll. Run against the roster and the award, filed through STP.
- Stock. Opening and closing counts where you run them, because without them food cost is only ever an approximation of purchases.
Purchases are not food cost. If you bought heavily in the last week of the month, purchases overstate what you actually used. Stock movement is what turns one into the other.
What it lets us tell you
| Line | Where we want it | Where it starts costing you |
|---|---|---|
| Wage cost | at or under 30% of sales | 35% is where we start calling it a leak |
| Food and beverage cost | at or under 36% of sales | 40% and the menu needs work |
| Prime cost, wages plus stock | at or under 62% of sales | 68% and the venue is running for someone else |
| Rent | at or under 10% of sales | 15% and the site has to earn its keep |
The bands we work to on a standard single-site venue. Licensed venues, function work and heavy takeaway sit differently, which is part of the conversation.
Once the file is current, the monthly review stops being a history lesson. It becomes a short conversation about two or three things worth changing.
Most venues sit on Hospitality Margin Protection at $990 + GST a month, which carries the bookkeeping, payroll for up to five staff and BAS oversight underneath the monthly margin review.
Common mess we fix on takeover
- Everything coded to one cost of sales account
- Delivery platform deposits booked as gross sales, or as net sales with the commission lost
- Tips and surcharges treated as revenue when they are not
- Wages posted from the bank rather than from payroll, so super and PAYG do not tie out
- Owner purchases mixed through the business card with no separation
Run the 60-second Margin Check on your own figures. Nothing is sent anywhere; it runs in your browser.
Straight answers.
Do we need to do stocktakes?
For a real food cost number, yes, at least monthly. Without counts you have a purchases ratio, which tells you direction and not much else.
Can you deal with our suppliers directly?
We handle the paperwork and the coding. Ordering and negotiation stay with you, though we will tell you which supplier moved and by how much.
Stop finding out in July.
Fifteen minutes, direct with Pink. We look at your real numbers and tell you where the margin is going.