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5 Essential Steps to Improve Efficiency & Profitability of Your New Restaurant

9 out of 10 new businesses fail and the common cause of failure is their inability to make profit. Restaurant businesses are no exception; you may have the best chefs, ideal location and sufficient marketing budget, but if your restaurant operations lack efficiency, you are losing marginal profits.

A restaurant’s profitability largely depends on efficiency which can be acquired only by implementing processes. Once you have efficient processes in action, you avoid wasting energy, materials, time, money and efforts, and as a result your restaurant grows.

As a new restaurant owner, finding ways to improve your restaurant’s efficiency can be challenging. There are tens of areas that need your attention and you don’t know where to start. This article will discuss the five essential steps with which you can improve efficiency and profitability of your restaurant. Each step will guide you through practical tips for setting up processes that will help your restaurant be more efficient. Profit follows the efficient operations.

1- Set up an Efficient Inventory Management System

Nothing is worse than running out of key ingredients in the middle of preparing an order. Having a good inventory management system in place can ensure this never happens. Get a robust inventory management system as a top priority.

There are various inventory software available in the market, and with a little research you can find one that best suits your business. Make sure, it is cloud based inventory management so you can access it from anywhere anytime.

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Moreover, you should also have a trusted vendor like GoCheetah for on time and hassle free delivery of ingredients. GoCheetah is mobile app available for both iOs and Android. Once signed up, you can browse the catalog and add items to your basket, and get next day delivery. With your first order, you automatically create a shopping list which you can reorder whenever needed. You can also signup for a subscription plan which will enable you to save more.

With efficient inventory management you know when you need to restock and with a trusted partner like GoCheetah you can restock your supplies on time.

You save a lot of time, money and effort with this single process implementation, let’s move to the next steps.

2- Set up an Efficient POS System

With an efficient POS system, you can drastically improve back-end and front-end restaurant operations at once. This streamlines your day-to-day operations and enhances the productivity of employees, i.e. taking orders and sending them to the kitchen. But most importantly, it offers in depth data for analytical purposes, i.e. per order value, average daily sales, peak hour sales, data about seasonal sales and promotions and so on.

With this data handily available, your can take timely actions to fix deficiencies and formulate new strategies to improve your overall business.

3- Invest in Your Staff

Providing your staff with the best software is a great way to improve the processes, but it’s not enough. You also need to train them to use these software effectively.

Moreover, you also need to train your employees for stress management (handling the peak times), crisis management, customer services, and all this requires time and money. Do not hesitate in hiring and training the best staff possible.  Show your employees that you want to help them be the best they can be in their job and they will surely work hard for you and remain loyal.

4- Invest in Customer Experience

At the day end it’s all about customer’s experience, because they are the people who will help you build reputation.

Enhancing customer experience, doesn’t require any rocket science. Simple things can make big difference; for instance, using a tablet-based system (whereby the servers open tabs and take orders) can enhance customer experience while improving the efficiency (cutting down wait times).

If your restaurant has a home delivery option, consider free delivery, innovative packaging and complementary dessert coupons for their next visit to the restaurant.

Get your customers and prospects engaged in healthy conversations over social media, value their opinion, engage them in contests and promotions and let them become your brand ambassadors and advocates.

5- Attract Strategic Partnerships

Strategic partnerships can skyrocket your brand, so consider such opportunities right from the beginning. There can be hundreds of ways for restaurants to utilize strategic partnerships, but let me discuss a few popular ones.

  • Partner up with local businesses and offer a discount to every referral.
  • Partner up with event management companies for catering services in their events.
  • Partner up with delivery services like Uber Eats, Zomato etc.
  • Partner up with food manufacturing companies to use their ingredients and get included in their marketing materials.

The more strategic partners you have the more business you will get, but choice of right strategic partner makes a big difference, so choose wisely.

The Bottom Line:

There may be tens of other ways to improve efficiency & increase profitability of your restaurant business, and you cannot do all at once. Going step by step is the key to success. The above five are great to start with and put your business on a growth track. Once these processes are set well, you can start exploring the other options.

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