Meals For Thought - Is Your Meals And Refreshment Establishment Being Handled Co
I eat food. I consume beverages.
For that reason, I am qualified to supervise a Food and Beverage operation.
In examining the operations of numerous clubs/resorts monthly, I find that a person of the most badly operated, irregular locations of club/resort operations is Food and Beverage. Especially in member owned environments, which are frequently supervised by a club board, individuals appear to think that since they dine out, they somehow have some level of knowledge that permits them to make business choices about this important element of the club. The reality is that this is one of the most intricate departments in a club to manage, control, and produce a consistent experience.
Let's ask a couple of concerns!
Is your Food and Beverage experience appropriate for what your members/guests want to have in your club/resort? Are you priced appropriately, too high, or too low? How do you understand? Are you tracking cover counts by day? By shift? By hour?
Are your food choices stuck in the past, a great balance of old favorites and brand-new choices, or edgy? Is your menu created for function or fashion? Do you alter your menu quarterly, or at least semi-annually to keep it fresh? Or is it altered every year or more and become a club dinosaur? What are your product specs and part sizes? Is every item on your menu costed? What is your objective for a la carte food expense? Do you understand the contribution margin on every item on your menu?
What about your unique occasions. Are they really unique? Do they create a buzz in the Club? Are they eagerly expected or the same thing that was done the last 10 years with nothing more than the year changed in the newsletter and marketing piece promoting the event? Is your personnel challenged every quarter to attempt brand-new events? New rate points?
Got Worth?
What about value added programs? It's happening every day in the hospitality industry. Chili's, Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, Flemings, Cody's Roadhouse, McDonalds, Quiznos, Train, and many other national franchises are actively programming to keep individuals being available in. Any question the success rate of franchises is over 90% while the success rate of separately owned restaurants is about 10%?
What are you performing in your club to create a "WOW" for your members/guests in your Food and Beverage offerings? Are you standing pat on your filet and sea bass wondering why you are doing so few covers? Or, are you trying new principles that may offer "meal replacement" dining instead of only "unique occasion" dining?
Something as basic as Pleased Hour can produce additional use. Home cooking such as meatloaf, chicken casserole, lasagna, or similar for" at or throughout the week are popular. Taco bars, pasta bars, burger night, half rate on bottles of home red wine, Fresh Fish Fridays or a Friday Fish Fry, a Chef's choice at an unique rate on slower nights, sushi nights, appetisers at a special cost, entertainment, and numerous other ideas and occasions drive usage, supply incremental profits, and keep the personnel working. Are you try out brand-new events in your club/resort? Offer it a shot. You'll be surprised at the buzz it develops.
The Experience
How is your dining-room provided? With white tablecloths? No table linens? Placemats? Are you charging appropriately for the experience you are providing?
How are your buffets provided? Elegantly with skirting, flower display screens, and glossy silver chafing meals? Or fundamental with little or no frills? Does it make good sense?
Do you have requirements of operation to make sure the food and beverage experience for your members/guests? Is every employee wearing a tidy and pushed designated uniform? Is there a particular way to present menus, serve, food, mixed drinks, and wine? Are members called by name? Are specific steps of service in location?
Does the service personnel know the composition of every product, sauce, and portion size from the menu? Is training provided a minimum of month-to-month? Is your personnel offering suggestively?
The Technical Aspects
How often do you take a physical inventory? Exists "self-reliance" in the stock process to make sure that the counts are precise? Is stock rates changed routinely to reflect the most current cost the club is spending for all inventoried items or is the cost the club paid in 2015 still being used to identify stock worth?
Do you follow this mantra when getting and inventorying items?
If you buy it by the pound, weigh it. If you buy it by the piece, count it. If you purchase it by ounce or length, determine it? Under no situations, accept it blindly.
I am astonished at how often shipments are accepted and signed for without even physically remaining in the same room as the items that were delivered not to mention examining the packing slip or invoice against the goods received. Delivery individuals become savvy extremely rapidly to those who hold them liable and those who do not. A couple of pounds of missing steak here or a few bottles of missing alcohol there costs a lot of cash over a prolonged amount of time.
How much unusable food is stashed away in the freezer, often a chef's buddy, and continues to be counted on a monthly basis throughout inventory yet is basically worth little or absolutely nothing?
What does the organizational structure appear like in your club's F&B operation? How are your supervisors compensated? Are they incented to produce a specific monetary result, train the personnel, and keep requirements? Or are they paid simply for showing up?
How is your service personnel paid? By per hour wage? Pointer swimming pool? Some combination of both? Does your pay structure promote tenure or turnover? What about overtime? Are you paying overtime? Legally?
In addition to costing every product on every menu, have you done the same for liquor, beer, and wine? Do you have specified pour sizes? Are they being followed? Do you have pourers which enable just for the put size for which you are charging? How much of your club's resort's money is bound in red wine inventory? Have you established par stocks?
Do you have a Food and Drink minimum? Does it make good sense for your club? Do you have a minimum regular monthly service fee? Should you?
Do you offer a staff member meal? How is it accounted for? Is it accounted for at all? Do you allow staff members to remove food/beverage from the club? (A bad concept!). Do you allow your components of computer workers to consume alcoholic beverages at the end of a shift? (An even worse concept!!).
Personal Occasions
What about your Private Occasions? Is your catering menu priced right? What does priced ideal mean? Have you examined the competitive environment? What are you doing to bring wedding events and conferences to the club/resort? Are you covering the costs of setting up and breaking down every space based upon the varying requirements of each occasion?
Do your personal event policies make sense? When is the "assurance' due? When is payment completely required? Do you require a signed agreement? Do you even have an agreement that you need be signed?
An Option
Lots of questions! Get a management business that will work collaboratively with you to respond to all of these and any others and produce a personalized food and drink experience that reflects your special circumstance and offers what your members/guests desire and are willing to spend for.
