Restaurant owners will open their monthly P&L reports, and look at sales, then scroll down to the bottom of the report and close the report.
Does it sound familiar?
The report may be perfectly correct, but if they are the only two numbers that are being examined, most of its value is being put to waste.
Good restaurant bookkeeping shouldn’t make owners more dependent on an accountant. It should help them feel confident in their own numbers. It doesn’t require an accountant or stay up all in the dark completing invoices. It’s important to understand what caused the change in profit, what happened with the use of labor and food and which areas require to be addressed next week.
That’s the philosophy Bookkeeping Chef’s mission: to Automate the bookkeeping process which doesn’t require the owner’s time and gives restaurant managers more precise financial data they can actually utilize.
You should begin by looking at the Weekly Numbers and Not Just Month-End
A monthly P&L is crucial, but restaurants don’t operate monthly. This week, managers are planning their activities. Chef has ordered food. Vendors change prices now.
Bookkeeping Chef offers weekly flash reports on top costs and monthly financial statements.
The principal cost includes the cost of labor and the purchase of goods and labor, two areas where the restaurant could make rapid progress. Bookkeeping Chef’s supplied information notes that prime costs usually comprise approximately 60% of restaurant sales.
Suppose sales have barely changed however, the cost of prime increases. This percentage alone isn’t enough to provide the solution. It provides the person with the reason to conduct an investigation.
Did the hourly wage rise? Did overtime happen? Was the cost of food increased? A vendor’s invoice was abnormally high. Did sales mix changes?
This is much more valuable than identifying the same issue two weeks later.
Automate repetitive tasks
DIY bookkeeping does not have to involve manually transferring POS (point of sale) totals onto spreadsheets.
Automating the restaurant’s bookkeeping process can reduce repeated data movement. The service is able to integrate systems like POS as well as QuickBooks payroll vendor platforms and inventory management.
Automation is not the objective.
It’s a way to streamline data entry and to keep financial records updated so that the owners are able to spend their time reviewing information instead of assembling it.
It provides a completely new bookkeeping system for restaurants. Technology manages the mechanics while the proprietor is involved with the financial aspects.
Learn to Ask the P&L Better Questions
Stop taking your P&L as the accounting test.
Start with sales. Next, look at the expenses necessary to achieve the sales. Compare the food and beverages performances. Consider labor. Keep working to cut down your operating expenses.
Compare the different periods.
If profits increase, but sales aren’t, it is some variation between the two. What was the result when food prices rose? Compare staffing with sales to see if the labor percent has changed. Check if the percentage seems unusual, rather than believing that the restaurant went through poor performance.
Bookkeeping Chef offers monthly P&Ls which are finalized in just five business days. This provides owners the chance to examine recent performance rather than receiving financial statements for a long time after the operating time is over.
Speed is important, but the objective is to learn.
It’s not necessary to do everything.
You can find a compromise between hiring someone else to manage all of your financial tasks as well as being your own accountant full-time.
A business owner can be engaged without having to manually complete each accounting job.
This could mean connecting to automated systems to ensure information flows and analyzing a weekly prime-cost report, looking at the monthly P&L and posing questions when something moves unexpectedly.
Services for bookkeeping in restaurants that focus in the restaurant industry can assist owners understand the meaning of the reports by organizing the books and keeping them organized.
It is unlikely that you’ll find an accountant that can do all of the functions.
Owners who are able to take a seat and converse intelligently about their business with the P&L will be more successful.
The goal is Financial Independence Not More Reports
Restaurants already produce huge amounts of data. A dashboard doesn’t always make sense.
When an operator can look at the weekly prime cost report and discover that something has changed, they can then open up their P&L to see what needs additional analysis.
Bookkeeping Chef’s method incorporates restaurant accounting automation, daily reports, monthly P&Ls as well as restaurant-specific financial assistance to make this process possible.
Automate the repetitive work. Examine your prime cost each week. Understand the language employed within your P&L.
There is no need to be an accountant to be an.
It is essential to be aware of the financials of your establishment before you are able to become the proprietor.