Business owners rarely get time to really take a break and pause. Having some quiet time for reflection and planning is so vital, as these are often the last things on a long list of deliverables needed to keep the day-to-day business going.
This is most true for entrepreneurs and small company owners. If there’s a silver lining to be found in the COVID-19 situation facing us, it’s realizing that there’s no better time to sit back and take a look at your business and the relationships you’ve built to prepare for a better, and much busier, future.
What can you do for your restaurant, menus, and relationships
We’re going to go over some things businesses normally don’t have time to really get into, but what some downtime can really help build.
Recipe Costing:
One of the biggest stumbling blocks in a smoothly run restaurant is the pricing out of your menu. Time-consuming and fluctuating, it’s always been a struggle for food distributors and restaurants to stay on top and increase profitability. This ends up affecting the bottom line more than one might think. Properly pricing out a menu can add 2-4% to a business’ bottom line.
Having the time to really do research and shop around your sources of food and products is really a fantastic solution to often overworked restaurant owners and chefs. Now you can look into not what’s most easily available, but what actually works best for you or your business. Changing vendors, delivery services or really taking the time to see how you can cut on food waste are all amazing options to pricing out your menu better and preparing well for the inevitable wave of consumers coming your way.
Menu and Recipe Design:
Besides looking into the costs of food and business partners, it’s never been a better time to rework your menu. Especially if you’ve been serving food that has had the same feel for too long, the quiet time of fewer clients or more online orders opens up your kitchen to new, challenging flavors and experimentation.
Reworking dishes and flavors, or pivoting into new fields of nutrition is never easy. The newfound time is perfect to create the space needed to whip up that dream menu you’ve always wanted but never had the time to. On top of that, having the time to nutritionally analyze what goes into your meals and work on calorie counts or nutrition labels is an added, huge bonus. It all ensures that once the pandemic is over, your business will have a new, fresh feel that will entice your old clientele and bring in new, intrigued patrons with amazing menu design.
Working on Relationships:
Besides renewing menus and planning out your meals, this is the perfect time to really connect with your vendors and manufacturers. Not only will these conversations better build your idea of costs, but newly forged deals are a possibility with better, more competitive pricing. Meticulously checking if you’ve got the best, most eco-friendly, most well-rounded produce, delivery systems, and partners is the way forward in the new year coming ahead.
Additionally, taking the time to really engage and connect with customers online via emails, social media, and on your website will only serve to figure out your market, demand, and overall brand message, ending in an optimized product that suits and excites your clientele.
Recipe Costing Software as Part of your Strategy
Menusano is your answer to the most tedious, yet the most important aspects of menu creation and finance. We help you take care of your recipe costing so that you can spend the majority of your time on what’s essential; the relationships you build as a dedicated restaurant and business owner.
If you’re looking for new strategies, our nutrition analysis software will list all recipes and associated costs, making it easy to analyze the prices that need adjusting. Once the price of each ingredient is entered, the total amount to make the recipe is calculated automatically. Knowing the cost per yield allows you to add to your bottom line. At any time, export all recipe costs or all ingredients into Excel making reporting a breeze.
If you need a nutritional label when your recipes are finalized, MenuSano offers a nutrition facts label for each dish. These include important allergen information that can be added to food menus. Labels are available to download as an image or PDF file.
There’s nothing sweeter than saving money and building your business without having to compromise on quality, information, or taste. Try our 14-day free trial today and let MenuSano be a part of your menu engineering strategy.
