ahhh, I need help

So I guesse I am in a kinda good pickle, but still a pickle. This last month I have been seriously tracking my sales, and I have come up with a few great and horrifying facts. I am spending 4k on just pizza product, a week on product and am only doing 7.5 a week in just pizza sales. So I am odviously sitting on a pretty substantial problem. I believe that my product cost is hugely high. I am pushing roughly 100 deliveries a day on average and am using a pos system that will not even allow me to log out deliveries.

I am hoping that I can get some imput on what pos system to look at to allow me to track runs perfectly. I am guessing that there are 4-5 runs a night that are not getting logged. I am also looking for a pos that can help with my product managment and product ordering. any help on this would be very apreciated.

on last question is how much are people paying per pound of a good moz block. thanks.

I dont think there is a POS out there that can help you with a 53% pizza food cost (should be 1/2 that)…100 deliveries a day…i would hope you are selling a large amount of non-pizza items b/c the numbers donty make any sense…good mozz $1.53/lb…any decent POS wold have delivery mgmt that assigns orders to drivers…seems like your drivers are robbing you blind

Okay, let’s help you out here:

First, let’s get to the delivery aspect: 100 deliveries/day x $15 ticket avg = $1,500/day in deliveries x 7 days/week = $10,500/week in delivery-only sales. This is not including any kind of carryout sales. So I’m assuming you’re a little inflated on the delivery numbers you listed or your ticket average is way down there around $8, which brings me to the next point: Food Cost…

Here’s how you can figure out what your food cost is supposed to be:

It’s a little old school, but if your POS system doesn’t support it, you’ve got to do it this way…

I assume you have portioning standards (i.e. 40 pepperoni’s on a large pizza, 8 oz. of cheese, or whatever). Run an ideal food cost on a weeks sales. This will take several hours but it will let you know exactly where you’re supposed to be. Here’s how you do an ideal food cost:

Take your portioning standards and apply them to the pizzas that were made each day. For example, if a customer has ordered 2 large pepperoni and sausage pizzas with 2 drinks you can figure out how much you would ideally spend on that order by breaking it down:

Large dough patty = $ ?
40 pepperonis = (I think 1.5 ounces) How much are you paying per pound? Divide by 16 (ounces per pound), multiply by 1.5 (ounces) and that will give you the cost of putting pepperonis on a large pizza.
sausage = (How many ounces) x (How much per ounce)
Sauce = (How much are you paying per ounce) x (How many ounces of sauce do you put on a pizza?)
Cheese = same formula
Box= How much per box?

2 drinks = How much per bottle of soda?

Now, once you’ve finished the cost of the order, divide it by net sales of that order as a percent. This will tell you what your food cost percentage is for that order. You should be around the 30% mark or a little under. Now, of course, doing this same thing for an entire week’s worth of orders can be a little monotonous, but if you truly want to know where you’re at on food cost, this is what you’ve got to do.

Suppliers: If you think you’re getting jacked by your supplier, there’s only one way to find out. Go to another and have him compete for your business. Do NOT give him a pricing sheet, but make him come up with pricing on his own. Usually, when they don’t know, they’ll over-compensate in some areas, lowering prices to ensure they can steal your business.

Now, in conclusion, everything I’ve just told you will determine where your problem is, whether it’s your pricing, portioning, supplier, or theft. But, this process will also take you a few weeks minimum.

To avoid all this in future stores, find a POS system that will track everything for you. There are some that are very cheap and some that are very expensive. Most will do about the same thing so shop around. The biggest part about finding a POS system is find one that’s right for you and fits your needs. But remember, the two things that an owner/operator/manager can control in a store that affect the bottom line are Food Cost % and Labor Cost %. The closer you can get the two of these to the 50% mark, the better your store runs and turns a profit. You let any one of these two variable costs slide, and you’ll feel the impact in your bank account. Hope this helps. -J_r0kk

j rOCC, I looked at one of your previouse posts, about pitting your supliers against each other. i will probably be setting a meeting with sysco and a local cheese suplier on monday. I am selling roughly 14k a week, in combined pizza and apitizers, subs, salads, and so forth. sorry for messing up on the figures, I guesse it is the straight pizza/ wing/ breadstick sales that are killing me on product. I did some closer examination and I am just pushing 41%. product, for pizza, wings, and breadsticks.

I am also not used to this type of business, last year I would staff one - two drivers a night and this year I am running 4 drivers on a sunday, tonight even. I am sure with my delivery system that I am loosing 4-5 runs a night to lost tickets.

I believe that with the increase in business, I have been trying to do all I can to just keep the food prept and everything working correctly. I think what I really need is a pos system that manages the managers for me, as well as product cost. a pos system that prompts the employees and mangers alike to do what is supposed to be done.

Tommy,

Sounds like all your dreams are coming true but now you’re having a tough time handling them. No worries. If this was everybody’s problem, nobody would have problems. Give me a call and we’ll talk a little about it (785)236-9679. -J_r0kk

yup, it’s official… j_r0kk is the freakin’ MAN !!

Hi Tommy,

With the volume you are doing & hopefully it will grow even bigger, you HAVE to the way you are calculating and monitoring your inventory and pricing. This way you KNOW where you should be pricewise and stockwise & you concentrate building the business with no fears.

You really should look & buy FOOD COST PRO! It is, by far, the best software out there for everything you need. Once you enter your inventory and costs, it calculates every item on your menu and gives you an EXACT price you are paying & what you should be selling for. The inventor of this software is “Big Dave” Ostrander, the Pizza Doctor". Everyone knows he’s the best in the business for fixing any problems and getting you where you should be. I own his product - I do not work for him - it’s just that good and has changed our operation around dramatically!
Give me a call at: 859-586-1688 (w) or 859-380-1037 (cell) and I will share with you any info I can & maybe answer your questions. Believe me my friend, this software has been AWESOME! Give me a buzz.

hope this helps,

Phil Santamassino
Nicky’s “World Famous” Pizzeria
Hebron, KY

Just a comment - there is no POS system that will “fix” all this. A POS won’t manage your managers…
It COULD be a great tool, but remember - it’s just a peice of software, and like all software, it is only good at doing WHAT YOU TELL IT TO DO.
So if you want to use a POS to enforce management practices, and carefully document deliveries - you’re going to need to DESIGN, and CONFIGURE the thing to support the way you want your business run. I’m guessing what you might look for in a POS vendor would be not just price, and not hardware, but look for someone who can HELP YOU GET IT SET UP to do what you say you want. That might be hard to tell right away - but it definitely has value I think…

MM

As far as POS systems go I use Speedline and it works great. The delivery part of it tracks everything. Give them a call.

I agree about Food Cost Pro, it rocks! Version 2 is out now as well and I bought one and have been using it to setup my menu and pricing, so far I could not be happier. I got mine from www.pointofsuccess.com because it is set up to work stand alone or with their Pos software. Good luck!

Yup, can’t beat the $599. I use Point Of Success myself. There are some little issues with it, but Jeff is working on getting them fixed. -J_r0kk

It really is a steal at that price isn’t it? I think they do a really great job as well, Penny and Jeff have been fantastic to deal with. I also like the fact that they are only about an hour and a half away from me.

WOW, Thanks for the imput guys, I will deffintily be giving you a call, I luckly get some time off this weekend to do my favorite thing… Make coffee… yeah, I am Tommy the Barista this weekend. Anyways, My dreams are slowly becoming a reality, and none to soon either. I have recently met with the local diamond touch distributor and liked there product but am teriffied by the 5k per pc cost. I am looking at running 8 stations, thats with delivery computer and a backup phone station… I at one point tonight was using my fax line to take orders… LoL. But you would think that I could turn a profit. maybe with your guys awsome help it will be possible. Your personal feed back on the Point of Success soft ware is going to be invaluable. it will really help with makeing the decicion to purchase.

as far as product control I am puting some pretty strict rules out about pop and food concumption while on shift. hopefully it will help out.

8stations? are u doing 50K/week? seems a bit much to me

Yeah, Perry’s right. I would think, to do $7k comfortably, you’d want:

3 ordertaking stations
1 makeline monitor
1 driver dispatch screen
1 office computer

And $5k per station? No wonder they call the place "Diamond"Touch. Do people really pay that much for POS systems? When I look at shelling out 30 grand, I’m thinking equipment package, not computers. But that’s just me. -J_r0kk