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[Restaurant Community]

All Restaurateurs know that every penny counts and that very few of the pennies are making it to the pockets of the owners.

It is critical that the employees know where the money goes and how little is left at the end of the day. If the employees are properly educated about the financial operations of the restaurant they can come up with ideas to eliminate waste and increase efficiency. After all, the employees want the restaurant to survive if for no other reason that they need the job.

Does anyone have any ideas about how to educate the employees in the area of restaurant finance?

[mattm]

About six months ago we started a program to share our financial information with our employees. It is amazing to learn what your employees think about how much money the company is making and how much is free for you to take home.

Even more amazing is the response we received once we started educating our employees about where the money goes. More importantly, we have educated them on how all of this contributes to what we can pay them and also how secure their jobs are.

This education has brought about a new attitude around our company. The employees are coming up with ideas to improve efficiency and decrease waste. We are sharing the economic benefits with our employees.

[Robert44]

Give each employee a $1.00 in pennies. The name of the games is to subtract out penny/'s associated with every cost.

After you have paid all the labor, rent, utilities, professional fees, advertising, taxes and etc, what do they have left?

Then you can translate that into your meal prices. Say you have $0.04 left after all expenses. If you sell a $5 cheese burger for example and the restaurant made $0.18.

How many of those burgers do you have to be sold to pay for a broken plate, or cutlery that was thrown in the garbage?