How inflation is affecting restaurants and where Costmenu can help

Perspective and article revolving around a local Boston pizzeria as an example of the current inflation situation as it relates to restauranteurs. Higher costs for food, labor, rent, gasoline and cooking gas make it harder for casual dining places to buy, cook and deliver meals. And they're limited in how much they can pass on to customers.

The following article was posted by: NPR
Titled: Restaurants that survived the pandemic are now threatened by inflation
URL: https://www.npr.org/2022/05/11/1096975182/restaurants-pandemic-inflation-food-prices
Date Posted: May 11, 2022 and was Heard on the Morning Edition.

The key take-aways from the article are as follows:

• 'Inflation is just ridiculous now.'
• All prices are increasing and not just food: rent, labor, utilities, and others are increasing.
• Wholesale costs up 17% and restaurant labor costs up 15%.
• Costs increasing so often that he no longer prints menus in order to keep flexibility on menu costs.
• Some items are being removed because of costs and or because of lack of inventory.
• Some 90,000 restaurants in the U.S. have closed down temporarily or permanently since the pandemic.
• Costs are high so some people are eating in now more than eating out.

This article can also be supported by our previous one: 2022 state of the restaurant industry report available

Costmenu can help restaurant owners address the concerns noted above as we provide the following solutions:

Track Real Time Food Costs as they relate to inflation.

Tracking food cost and prepared item costs are critical to make sure menu items are priced right in order to get the proper returns. See in real time the effect of inflation and adjust with proper insight versus a 'gut reaction'.

Easy adjustments to compensate for additional costs.

Costmenu provides two additional fields for waste and add-on percentages. These percentages can be used for adjustments in order to compensate for the other ancillary costs percentages such as labor, utility costs increase, and other factors associated with the food preparation and business items.

Costmenu's Menu Builder feature provides flexibility.

Costmenu provides an easy way to keep printed and digital menus updated. In addition, Costmenu's QR Code label maker and document storage is great for digital menus if and when prices are fluctuating or if menu items are removed.

Costmenu's pricing is very cost-effective.

Our pricing options are very cost-effective and will help provide the insight in order to make informed decisions on menu pricing, and where to cut costs elsewhere. Our system will pay for itself with the just information gleaned from analytics. If Costmenu can save you money, then you can pass that savings along to your customers and allow them go back out and enjoy your services.

About Costmenu:
Costmenu is a food/menu/recipe costing software that offer many advantages over excel spreadsheets and other inventory management programs. Costmenu integrates a powerful dashboard, food, prepared, and menu item costing features, menu building features, custom qr code label makers, document storage, event/catering management features, data security, performance measurement, data analysis and comparisons, CRM, and generation of various reports. For more information on Costmenu, visit https://costmenu.com, email sales@costmenu.com, or phone (949) 274-4814.