Restaurants & Bars
Thin margins, high volume, constant chaos. We track food cost, labor, tips, and the hundred other places money leaks in this business.
The Margin You're Actually Running
A good restaurant makes 5% net profit. Many run at 3%. Some run at zero and find out when the landlord calls. At those margins, a small mistake wipes out the month. A medium mistake wipes out the quarter.
The dining room looks packed. Tickets are printing. None of that tells you if you made money. Food cost, labor, and overhead eat almost everything that comes in. The sliver that’s left is yours. We make sure you know exactly how big that sliver is.
Prime Cost
Prime Cost
Food plus labor. Should be under 65% of revenue. If you don’t know yours, you’re flying blind. We calculate it monthly so you can actually manage it.
Who This Is For
Who This Is For
Full-service restaurants, bars, cafes, fast casual, food trucks, breweries, catering. Different formats, same brutal math.
Where the Money Leaks
You priced your menu at 30% food cost two years ago. Since then, beef went up, your produce guy switched suppliers, portions drifted, and nobody adjusted anything. Now you’re running 35% and wondering why there’s no cash after a busy month.
Labor is the same story. Overtime you didn’t authorize. Training hours that pile up. Closers who milk the clock. The schedule says 30% but the payroll says 34%. Both numbers are real. The gap is where your profit went.
Food Cost Tracking
Food Cost Tracking
What you should be running based on recipes versus what you’re actually running based on purchases. The gap tells you where to look.
Labor Reports
Labor Reports
Weekly labor as a percentage of sales. You see problems while there’s time to adjust the schedule, not after the month is already gone.
Tips, Cash, and the Daily Mess
Hundreds of transactions a day. Cash drawers, card tips, voids, comps, walkouts. Your POS says one thing. Your bank deposit says another. Making these numbers match is a job nobody has time for, so it doesn’t get done until tax season.
Then there’s tip reporting. Card tips paid out through payroll. Cash tips that may or may not get reported. Tip pools. Tip credits. Virginia has rules about all of this. Most restaurants are doing something slightly wrong and hoping nobody notices.
Daily Reconciliation
Daily Reconciliation
POS to deposit to books. Every day accounted for. Discrepancies caught in days, not discovered months later during a panic.
Tip Compliance
Tip Compliance
Cash tips, card tips, pools, payouts. Tracked correctly for payroll and taxes. Documented the way the IRS expects.
The Delivery Question
DoorDash, Uber Eats, Grubhub. They bring volume but take 25-30% off the top. That delivery order that felt like revenue? After commission, packaging, and food cost, you might have lost money on it.
We break out delivery separately so you can see what it actually contributes. Some restaurants discover it’s a profit center. Others discover they’d make more money turning off the tablet.
Channel Profitability
Channel Profitability
Dine-in, takeout, delivery. Each tracked separately. Know which channels make money and which ones just feel busy.
Platform Reconciliation
Platform Reconciliation
Commission, fees, chargebacks. We reconcile deposits against what platforms say they paid. The numbers don’t always match.
Greater Richmond's Small Business Bookkeeper
The Next Step:
A Short Conversation
Fifteen minutes to tell us what you're dealing with. We'll let you know how we can help and give you a clear price quote.
