Operating Costs / Industry Standards

Please put in your approximate costs for comparison:

Full Service Hotel Restaurant
Full Service Hotel Kitchen Banquets
Full Service Hotel Kitchen Overall
Full Service Restaurant
Full Service Conference Center Kitchen Banquets
Full Service Conference Center Kitchen Overall

I manage a full service , very high volume corporate conference and training center/hotel.
I run a 13.5 % Labor
30 % Food
1% Chemical/Cleaning

Your input would be appreciated.

By George (George) on Wednesday, March 01, 2000 - 04:01 pm: Edit

Here's a scary one (kind of)
Corporate Cafeteria with EDR

45% Labor
47% Food
2% Chemical/Cleaning

but it was a subsidized account charging between 2.74-3.50 for an entree (even if fresh salmon or sword)

By Rodriego on Thursday, March 02, 2000 - 10:05 pm: Edit

I run a medium size hotel operation with totalfood sales of about 2 million anually.

33% Food
18% Labour
1 % Chemical/Cleaning

By chris on Saturday, March 04, 2000 - 04:04 pm: Edit

I do weddings for 100 to 300
food 12 to 18%
labor 25 to 30%
cleaning 3%

By Cheftim (Cheftim) on Saturday, March 04, 2000 - 07:08 pm: Edit

I think we need more definition in this discussion.
Are we talking just Kitchen labor? Is it labor for the whole food operation?
is the Chefs Salary included?

I am a chef working for a catering operation inside a 270 room Residence Inn. Last year we did about
.88 mil food revenue.
I ran 22 % food cost
8.5 % Kitchen labor including dishwashers, without my salary
and .4 % yes point four percent chem/cleaning supplies

By Cheftim (Cheftim) on Friday, March 10, 2000 - 11:54 pm: Edit

Here is a link to the National Restaurant Associations Operating Ratios. Some good information.

http://www.restaurant.org/research/ratios.htm

By Peter Brogger on Wednesday, March 15, 2000 - 07:57 am: Edit

hello everyone where are the ratios for catering

By chefmrl on Thursday, April 27, 2000 - 09:21 pm: Edit

We run an "ALL YOU CAN EAT" Buffet. $4.5 Million
F&B sales. $19.95 pp

Monthly food costs range between 48 - 52%
For the last few years it ends up at 49% annually.

Labor cost for the entire F&B, security, Management and office runs between 16- 26% monthly.

Annually our labor cost ends up at 21%

Liquor pouring costs run 19%. With our wooden nickle happy hour, 21%.

We are a seasonally affected property.

Any other Buffets out there???

By XCHEFMIKE on Thursday, June 22, 2000 - 08:32 pm: Edit

I RUN A UNIT OF A CHAIN RESTAURANT FOR A BILLION DOLLAR MULTI-RESTAURANT CONCEPT WITH OVER A THOUSAND RESTAURANTS IN THE CASUAL DINING SEGMENT.
I RUN BOH LABOR @ 11.5%(DOES NOT INCLUDE CHEF, BUT INCLUDES SOUS')
I RUN FOOD COST @ 28.5% FYTD.
CHEMICALS AT 1.4%
THE AVERAGE FOR THIS INDUSTRY IS MUCH LOWER THAN HOTELS/RESORTS

By Dpconsu (Dpconsu) on Thursday, June 22, 2000 - 10:30 pm: Edit

You guys have it made here in the USA,
I operated my own catering company which was based in France but we only catered into Monaco or to Non EEC country registered yachts.So all of my sales were free of French VAT(33%) which really pissed them off. All of my labor was part-timers and paid in cash under the table through our Monaco account (no taxes in Monaco) but the operating costs alone in France were a killer! basic taxes to operate a company involves 12 different taxes which totaled out to about 54% of our annual "declared" gross sales, I used to get up at 4.30 AM every day to buy food at the local Monaco market in cash to avoid having to declare my inventory to the French tax investigators who harrased my business for the first 2 whole years every month.(The bain of being a Yank in France) Our food costs varied according to the menu and seasonality of the products asked for, but as an example, I charged about $8.00 per canape of fresh beluga caviar(1/8 ounce) on a blinis with sour cream.It cost me about $2.00 to do each one.(There was an embargo on Iranian imports at that time and to get caviar I had to fly to Bahrain and bring it back in kilo cans in a suitcase packed in dry ice).In the end I sold the company to a French caterer and got out of the country with a good profit. But I had to juggle the books to do so,(Tax evasion is a national pastime in France) especially when the socialists were in power.

Catering cannot be judged in the same way that one costs out a restaurant or hotel kitchen that has set menus and a fixed staff. The situation of seasonality in catering determins who you charge what for and that the same menu could cost less or more at another time. In general you try to keep the food costs down to about a third, labor to about 20% and pay your bills with the rest and hope to get some cash left over for yourself.

By Ungarot on Saturday, September 09, 2000 - 09:35 pm: Edit

I must have missed something at school... We were taught not only to account for Food and Labour, but also Overhead which included everything from packaging to rentals and chemicals. Where would these amounts be represented in the previous posts?

I am a Chef at a Cafe/Caterer/Cooking school in Canada and ours are as follows

Food 29%
Labour 19%
Overhead 27%

Of course things arent always as they seem, these amounts do not take into account purchases of new equipment and the high profits of the school as opposed to the Cafe.

Ungarot

By p2mire on Friday, February 23, 2001 - 05:32 pm: Edit

I didn't see fixed operating costs mentioned. I've owned and operated several restaurants, and lease expenses, payroll taxes and maintenace usually adds another 25-30 percent to the pie. I also encourage profit sharing in the kitchen, distributing the percentage saved in portion control, waste and spoilage. I also believe in pooling tips on the floor. Also believe in self banking. Any ideas out there. Phil