Why Your Food Cost Checks Out and the Margin Is Still Missing

Your recipe costing says 29%, your books say 33.5%. Here's how to find the gap between target and actual food cost – and what it really means.

Your Menu Is a Year Old. Your Purchase Prices Aren't.

You cost your menu once a year, but you buy every week. Here's how margin hides in that gap – and which price you should actually be using.

Menu Engineering Without Clean Data Is Reading Tea Leaves

Menu engineering is only as good as the contribution margins it sorts by. Three ways the matrix tips over – and how to set it up right.

Twenty Items Drive Your Food Cost

About 20 to 30 items make up 70% of your food cost. How to find them in an hour – and why the rest can wait.

The Expiry Date on Your Recipe Costing

Every recipe costing ages – and the error propagates all the way into menu engineering. How often you actually need to recalculate.

What's Wrong on Supplier Invoices, and Why Nobody Notices

Agreed prices that never arrive. Pack-size changes with no price adjustment. Four discrepancies hiding in almost every supplier invoice – unnoticed.

Labor Cost as a Percentage of Revenue Is the Wrong Metric

Your labor cost ratio says more about your revenue than about your team. Three metrics that actually measure productivity.

Food Waste Starts in Purchasing, Not the Kitchen

Food waste gets discussed mostly around portion sizes. The real lever sits three days earlier, at the order.

The Three Numbers You Need Every Day

A dashboard with 30 tiles steers nobody. Three numbers you can actually remember – and why the rest belongs in the monthly report.

Reactive Is Over

It almost never fails on analysis. It fails on timing. Why data should reach out to people, instead of the other way around.

Two Locations, the Same Menu, Two Different Results

Same menu, same prices, and still one location earns almost two euros more per guest. Where the difference comes from and how to analyze it.

Contribution Margin 1, 2 and GOP: Which Number Answers Which Question

Revenue and food cost are not enough. Which question contribution margin 1, contribution margin 2 and GOP each answer, and why the order matters.

Why a Monthly Result Tells You So Little About Your Operation

A monthly result is an average across sixty shifts. Some carry the operation, some cost money, and you never see either.

How to Tell Whether Software Really Helps in Daily Operation

Five questions you can use to test any system, ours expressly included.

Do You Need an Inventory Management System?

The honest answer is: it depends, and for many operations the answer is no. When a system pays off and when it does not.

Why the Right Price Increase Does Not Work the Same Everywhere

Five percent across the board is convenient and rarely right. Where an increase works, and where it gets expensive.

What a Second Drink Per Table Really Delivers

No new guest, no new menu, no higher price: what a second drink per table actually adds up to in a month.