6 Tips To Beat Inflation With Menu Engineering

Sometimes, even a minute change can have a significant result on the revenue of your restaurant. Menu engineering is one example that can help restaurateurs boost the profitability of their food and beverage business. It ensures that diners/guests are picking up their most profitable items. It is a process of designing the menu and deciding how things will be positioned and priced to improve restaurant profitability. 

So, it can be said that menu psychology or designing is the best and the most scalable method to beat inflation. Now, devising intelligent strategies for boosting food and beverage revenue is excellent, but managers and restaurateurs sometimes tend to overthink and become confused. In this article, you will learn different techniques to maximize the profitability of your restaurant to enrich customers’ experience. 

1. Analyze Customer Market

Understanding the status and palate of your guest is essential. And analyzing your customer market can help you achieve this. You also need to explore your current and potential customers and their preferences. Furthermore, analyzing your company’s profile, strengths, and weaknesses is another crucial aspect when working on strategies to boost revenue. 

Besides this, you also need to check which matrix – Stars, Plow-horses, Puzzles, and Dogs, you need to consider and follow. These will help you understand and identify your customer market and modify menu psychology strategies accordingly. 

2. Food Costing

When your loss or profit statement depicts loss due to food, you must first learn about food costs. It may include waste, over-purchasing of ingredients, inventory, improper cutting/trimming, portion control, etc. 

Checking on per plate cost is essential to establish a profitable selling menu. A typical food cost ranges between 20–40% of overall operating costs. And for sit-down restaurants, it ranges between 30% to 35%. 

3. Analyze Food Wastage 

Analyzing the cause or reason of food waste and controlling it by implementing strategies is another vital tip to consider to combat inflation. Communication can be the critical reason for wasting food. So, checking up on your employee’s language and understanding how to take orders properly is crucial. 

Keeping a check on the portioning and trash can is another significant way to reduce food waste. Sometimes, due to more significant portions – customers tend to leave the food on their plates once done, and this wastage can hamper your pocket later. 

4. Menu Design

Keeping your menu descriptive yet crisp and straightforward is another vital consideration to beat inflation via menu engineering. Consider using keywords that combine truth and emotions, like hand-picked beans. 

When pricing items, make sure not to put everything at $99. Consider ending psychological pricing like 16.65, 17.99, or so. Also, keep increasing the price as your business grows. 

5. Menu Planning

Planning what to include in the menu and what not is the most time-taking thing. It requires the words and opinions of the staff, directors, managers, chefs, and sometimes the customers. Besides this, you also need to focus on the type of service you will offer, timing, physical facilities, staff and equipment efficiency, promotional activities, etc. 

6. Customer Service

Ensuring the best customer service is another vital tip when devising strategies to combat inflation. Instruct and train your team about food safety, hygiene, portioning, food allergies, and, most important, communication. Your team must always follow the philosophy of “Hospitality=Generosity.”

Conclusion

These tricks have significantly been highlighted when you wish to combat inflation via menu engineering. These not just let you understand strategies to analyze your customer’s needs but also allow you to know where you are lacking. It will help you analyze your strengths and weaknesses.