Finding the Hidden Profits in Your Inventory and Ordering System
Running a restaurant is an art and a grind. Every day, you’re balancing great food, satisfied guests, and a bottom line that always seems to be under pressure. With rising food costs and unpredictable expenses, squeezing out every possible dollar of profit isn’t just smart—it’s survival.
One of the biggest missed opportunities? Your inventory and ordering system.
The Hidden Leak in Your Costs
Most restaurants focus on food costs at a high level—tracking prime costs, watching supplier prices, and trying to negotiate better deals. But there’s a deeper level of control that can help you claw back profits without cutting quality.
Think about how you’re managing your inventory and orders right now:
– Are you consistently over-ordering items that spoil before they’re used?
– Do you know which ingredients are creeping up in price month over month?
– Is your ordering system based on real data, or is it just a best guess?
Even small missteps—like ordering a case instead of a half-case, or letting a high-cost item sneak onto the menu more often than planned—can erode your margins without you even realizing it.
Tightening Up Your Ordering Process
1. **Track Your Actual Usage, Not Just Purchases**
Most operators look at invoices to estimate costs, but real profit is found in tracking how much product is actually used versus wasted. Keeping a close eye on portioning, spoilage, and over-ordering is key.
2. **Automate Price Tracking**
Ingredient prices fluctuate constantly, but tracking those fluctuations manually is a nightmare. Automating this process ensures you know when to shift purchases, swap menu items, or have the right conversation with your supplier.
3. **Streamline Your Ordering**
Many kitchens order based on habit rather than actual need. A good ordering system prevents unnecessary purchases by giving your team clear, data-driven par levels and order guides that reflect your real usage patterns.
4. **Catch Shrinkage Before It Becomes a Problem**
Whether it’s over-portioning, waste, or “walkaways,” small leaks add up. If you’re not actively monitoring where inventory is going, you’re leaving money on the table.
A Smarter Way to Manage It All
You don’t need a huge corporate budget to put a real system in place. AI is moving even the word of Restaurant Management forward by leaps and bounds. Here at Together Restaurant Consulting, MarginEdge has become a staple in our arsenal of tools that help many of the independent operators we work with automate invoice tracking, monitor ingredient costs in real time, and tighten up their inventory controls—all without adding another manual task to your plate.
Contact us to receive a discount for getting started, and if you’re interested, we can assist you in setting up with MarginEdge. Our goal is to empower you to make informed, data-driven decisions that reinvest more profits into your business. Begin today to create a system that truly supports your operations in this fast-paced and constantly evolving environment.
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