The restaurant’s owner will look at the sales and then at the bottom line before closing the report.
Do these sound like familiar to you?
It may be a perfectly exact report, but in focusing on just two numbers, it leaves a lot of its value in the dust.
They shouldn’t be more dependent on an accounting company. It should help them become more comfortable with their own numbers. It’s not necessary to spend in the dark putting together invoices or know every accounting rule. It is important to know how profit moved from food and labor costs and what questions need attention next week.
Bookkeeping Chef is an application which automatizes bookkeeping, so the owners can focus on other things while getting more clear financial reports.
Do Not Stop at the month-end Numbers. Begin with the Weekly Numbers
Restaurants do not operate on per month. This week, the managers plan their activities. Chef has ordered food. Vendors change prices now.
That’s the reason Bookkeeping Chef provides weekly prime-cost flash reports along with monthly financial statements.
The main cost is a combination of cost of goods and labor, two areas in which a restaurant can accelerate its progress. The information provided by the Bookkeeping chef indicates that the prime cost typically accounts for 60% of sales in restaurants.
Imagine the sales remained static, however the price of production grew. This percentage doesn’t provide an answer. It gives the owner reason to investigate.
Was there an increase in the number of hours employed? Did there occur overtime? Food costs changed? Did a vendor invoice seem excessively high? Did the sales mix change?
It is more beneficial to know about the problem now than later.
Automate repetitive tasks
DIY bookkeeping isn’t limited to manually transposing POS figures into spreadsheets.
Automating bookkeeping for restaurants can assist in the repetitive movement of financial data. The service integrates systems such as POS, QuickBooks payroll, vendor platforms, and inventory management.
Automating for the sake automation is not the objective.
It’s to cut down on manual data entry, and keep financial records updated so that owners have the ability to spend time reviewing information instead of making it.
This leads to a different style of bookkeeping for restaurants. technology can handle the mechanics, while the owner stays focused on the financial implications.
If you have more questions, you can ask them about P&L
A P&L can be a lot less intimidating when you stop treating it like an accounting test.
Begin with the sales. Examine the costs that are required to generate the sales. Compare the food and beverages performance. Check the cost of labor. Take a look at the labor.
And, most importantly, compare times.
If the sales rise but the profits aren’t, it is some variation between the two. If food costs increased, ask what happened operationally. If the labor percentage changed in the past, look at sales and staffing activity. If a figure appears to be odd take a look instead of assuming the restaurant simply had a bad month.
Bookkeeping Chef gives monthly P&Ls which are completed within five days. The owners are able to look over the financial performance of their business without waiting for months to receive financial statements.
Speed is important, however the goal is to understand.
You don’t have to handle everything on your own by doing it yourself
There’s a compromise between delegating all financial function to someone else and establishing yourself as your own full-time bookkeeper.
You can be involved as a business owner without performing all accounting tasks by hand.
This could mean the use of automated system connections in order to ensure information flows and analyzing a weekly prime-cost report, studying the monthly P&L and asking questions when something is happening unexpectedly.
Specialized bookkeeping services for restaurants can help with this by keeping the underlying books organized and assisting the owner to know what the reports mean.
However, this does not mean the owner will be able to perform all bookkeeping tasks.
Owners who are able to take a seat and converse intelligently about their business with the P&L will be more successful.
The objective is financial freedom, not more reports
Restaurants already generate enormous amounts of information. Another dashboard isn’t automatically useful.
Real value is when an operator can open a P&L report, recognize that there has been a change, and then review the reports on the cost of prime.
Bookkeeping Chef’s approach combines restaurant bookkeeping automation, weekly reporting, monthly P&Ls, and restaurant-specific financial support to make that possible.
Automate the repetitive work. Review your prime cost every week. Learn to speak the same language as your P&L.
You don’t have to be a professional accountant.
Owners who know the financial aspect of their restaurants will be able make better decisions.