Is running your business that far off from managing your own finances? The key to success is having a plan. Whether that is creating a budget in order to monitor expenses or creating a retirement plan (investor payback), setting benchmarks for 5 or 10 years down the road will lead you towards a path of success. Click here to see how Kerry Hannon of the NY Times maps out a retirement plan that encourages you to think into the future. While reading this think about how a plan like this can apply to your business. Do you have goals for 5, 10, 20 years down the road? Once your business start turing a profit how will you allocate those earnings?

In part 1 of this series we linked you to a quick video, provided by Bon Appetite, that went behind the scenes of a Chick-Fil-A. Now this may not touch home with everyones operation but hopefully if made you start to think about all of the moving parts to your business and how everything is interconnected.  In todays column, we highlight one of the most critical elements to any business- Labor.

According to the National Restaurant Association’s 2016 Restaurant Operations Report, labor costs make up a third of sales in a typical restaurant. This means that any increases in labor costs can have a significant impact on your bottom line.

To cut down on unnecessary spend, make data-driven staffing decisions. Excellent customer service and staff retention are always top priorities, and your staff are on the front lines of the customer experience. Equip your employees with information they need to perform well, and strategically place them in roles where they are needed and feel passionate.

• Compile data. Get granular with it. Dive deeper than simply identifying your restaurant’s peak service periods. Look for any overtime trends in your restaurant, and then determine how to get those numbers down without negatively affecting your operations.
• Avoid over- or under-staffing. Too many staff standing around the dining space can be off-putting to guests, and not enough staff in front- or back-of-the house can lead to bottlenecks and frustrated customers. Analyze your data, and make adjustments accordingly.
• Stagger departures and arrivals. Instead of setting block schedules that have singular arrival and departure times per shift, consider spreading out scheduled clock-ins and -outs by about 15 minutes for select positions. This can help eliminate the chance of not having enough employees on the floor.

This article was adapted from the Nation Restaurant Association and can be found here

America’s fast-food value meal is so popular for so many years. Like McDonald’s 20-piece pack of Chicken McNuggets goes for $5; Taco Bell’s Beefy Fritos Burrito for $1;KFC’s Fill-Ups menu promises lots of food for little dough for $5 and so on. However according to Andrew F. Smith, who is author of Fast Food: The Good, the Bad and the Hungry, pointed out there’s a dark side to a good these deals. Smith said “research has shown that bundled meals encourage customers to purchase more than they might if they just selected individual items, and this imperative to overbuy has impacted consumers’ wallets and waistlines for decades.” I think this is good reason why these fast-food restaurant can be successful so many years, and can still earn big profit on it.

If you want to know more informations about it, please click here.

All summer, Eleven Madison Park will be closed for renovations. While this is not ideal from a business perspective, it’s even less promising for the employees who would have been out of work for an entire season. Luckily, EMP Summer House will be debuting in June in the Hamptons and the EMP staff will be working on Long Island all summer long. The restaurant will be collaborating on a “number of unique experiences. American Express members will have first crack at getting a seating during the pop-up, but you could possibly get lucky with a walk-in spot if you are willing to pay cash.

You can read more about he event here.

On Wednesday, those two groups, and Walmart, announced that they had agreed to whittle that lexicon to just two phrases: “best if used by” and “use by.”

“Research shows that the multitude of date labels that appear on foods today are a source of confusion for many consumers,” Frank Yiannas, vice president of food safety and health for Walmart, said in a statement.

Read more here

We kick off this weeks Paige Papers with a special 6 part series dedicated to understanding the operations of your business. Here at TaraPaige we place a great deal of emphases keeping your costs low and running efficiently.  While sales and cash flow keeping the gears in motion, if there are flaws in the day to day process it will slowly deteriorate your companies infrastructure

Lets begin with a quick video produced by Bon Appetite featuring Deputy Editor Andrew Knowlton as he works 24 hours straight at the original Chick-fil-A in Hapeville, Georgia.

“A sommelier presented the unopened bottle for approval, so he could affirm it was the wine he had ordered. She then took it away for opening.

At restaurants where wine is not a particular point of pride, she might have opened it tableside, while carrying on the usual banter with diners. But at restaurants that take wine seriously, like Italienne, the sommelier will open the bottle in a private corner of the dining room. She will then take a small taste to make sure that the wine is not corked or flawed in some other way.”

Click here to continue reading

Coney Island is now accepting application for new vendors. Interested businesses can range from “amusements, games and/or ancillary entertainment attractions”, according to the RFP.  The New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) says,”sites are comprised of multiple city-owned properties located between Surf Avenue and the Coney Island Boardwalk, within the Coney Island amusement district”.

To sign up or apply click Here

If you would like to skip the sign up process, you’ve already done the leg work for you. Here is a PDF of the RFP: coney_island_east_rfp_final_6698-2-2