Hitting a wall when it comes to increasing your restaurant’s profitability? Want to ensure your business is financially ready to tackle a second location or menu expansion? You might need to update your restaurant technology. Here’s three ways the right tech helps improve your bottom line— from managing your inventory and purchasing, to making sure there’s always enough staff (but never too many cooks,) in the kitchen.
1. Eliminate Unnecessary Data Entry Tasks
Successful business owners know that good data is key to increasing profits, so why stick with outdated data entry practices that slow down employees and reduces profitability? Relying on multiple systems that require employees to manually enter ever-changing information simply can’t provide management with the data needed to make smart hiring, inventory, or menu-development decisions.
Fortunately, the latest cloud-based restaurant technology allows you to fully sync and consolidate existing systems and eliminates unnecessary data management. By automatically tracking inventory, employee schedules, and providing the real-time sales data, good tech helps drive up sales and improves efficiency.
And since cloud-based data can be accessed from any device, anywhere, owners and managers can make smart financial decisions even when out of the restaurant or while working at a second location.
2. Streamline the Purchasing Process
Too much inventory? You risk wasting expensive food items, increase the chances of a health-code violation, and waste valuable real estate in your back of house. Too little? There’s a chance you might run out of a favorite menu item, or risk frustrating your kitchen staff when they don’t have what they need to manage the dinner rush.
But managing purchasing and inventory doesn’t have to be overwhelming with right restaurant technology. By using an automated purchasing tool, you can set up electronic ordering, receive suggested purchasing recommendations based on past orders and current inventory, and enable automated orders whenever stock runs low. No more over-crowded walk-ins or last-minute grocery runs ever again.
3. Make a Daily Dream Team
You’ll need a perfectly-coordinated team of servers, hosts, and kitchen staff to manage the daily lunch or dinner rush, so don’t leave your scheduling up to chance or at the mercy of a hand-drawn schedule. And as labor and food-safety laws continue to evolve, using technology to keep track of your staff’s certification and food-safety permits is critical to making sure each employee is in compliance with both local and federal guidelines.
The right staffing software can also help prevent profit loss due to overstaffing and ensure you’re always running at optimal capacity. Look for a program that can generate data for hourly sales vs. cost of labor, provide up-to-the-minute updates on schedule changes or deficiencies, and can integrate with your payroll system so that everyone gets their paychecks on time. Not only will you keep your restaurant running smoothly, but you’ll reduce costly employee turnover as well.
Whether it’s a fine-dining establishment or quick-service franchise, the best restaurant technology is the software or program that allows your staff to focus on making and serving great food instead of trying to constantly manage schedules, purchasing, or inventory. Your customers will appreciate the undivided attention, and so will your profit margins!
