4oz Dressing Food Cost Suprise

[famouspizza]

OK so I have been lazy with my food cost but as I was shocked to find out that a 4oz Solo Cup & Lid of Blue Cheese costs me .36 & Ranch is not much better at .30…I thought it was more like .20 before I took the time to price it out

 

[New_York_Charlie]

Rather than buy gallons of dressing and pay for four ounce souffle cups and lids and pay someone or take the time to fill them I currently use packets of dressing. While there is less dressing in each packet there is less hassle and each one only costs between 18 and 22 cents depending on what it is. I would highly recommend that you change over.

 

[royster13]

We used to use food grade zip lock bags…They were about 2 cents each…Seems to me we used 2" x 3" size and they held about 2 oz…We used pumps on top of the salad dressings to dispense a pump into to each bag…Worked pretty good…RCS…

 

[famouspizza]

New York Charlie:

Rather than buy gallons of dressing and pay for four ounce souffle cups and lids and pay someone or take the time to fill them I currently use packets of dressing. While there is less dressing in each packet there is less hassle and each one only costs between 18 and 22 cents depending on what it is. I would highly recommend that you change over.

I actually tried that and it came back to bite me…nothing is worse than having a customer return something b/c the condiment they put on their fresh food is GREEN! Man was I pissed and swore to never use again. Plus I think our Chuncky Blue Cheese from Ken’s would be better. What do you use? I will give it a try…my waitresses will love you

 

[pizzapirate]

famouspizza:

Plus I think our Chuncky Blue Cheese from Ken’s would be better.

Agree, Ken’s is good stuff.

Depends on where you position yourself. IMO dressing packets are low end. Portioning you own dressings into the solo cups is a step up in quality and presentation.

Considered using the 3 1/4 oz solo cup? Its more than enough dressing for a full size salad. Its the size we use and we never get complaints or comments that it is not enough.

 

[goomba]

Hello famous,we use 2 oz not 4 at our place and I sell many salads.I buy the 2oz soufle cups w/ the lids seperately…what a scam but anyway why use a 4 oz? Let them ask to buy x/tra if they like that much dressing and then charge them .50 ea.as for the packets that would never work if your selling wings, can you imagine trying to squirt out a decent kens blue chse on your wings?
Niccademo

 

[Kris]

I agree with goomba. We also use 2oz cups for our dressing. We give a decent amount for salads and some do pay for extra dressing.

My other thought is maybe try and find a comparable brand of dressing. We use food service label (they have different levels of “good” dressing) for most of ours. We buy a great Ranch because that is our most popular.

A food show is a great place to get samples of dressings. We used to buy all High end dressing but found some comparable food service label dressings for much much cheaper.

I think packets are tacky.

 

[NicksPizza]

1. Ken’s produces a single serve, shelf stable pouch. I use their ranch, Bl cheese, hon must, ital, 1000 isl, and others. Ken’s bl ch came separated in the pouch several times (oily mess), so I hopped off to Kraft for a while. Now back, and consistency of product is better.
2. Refrigeration and handling in the work flow are prime considerations for me. If I have to have someone spend 30 minutes pumping up dressings (we used to do that as well), find a way to portion control each and every one for consistency, and then find a container to hold all the little cups in the cooler so they don’t fall over, and put them into the food packages from a refrigerated storage nearby . . .open-close-open-close-repeat. We went to the pouches, our customers loved them, and we’ve not looked back.

By the way, USBlue buttermilk ranch dressing is a REALLY good substitute for Ken’s ranch around here. It is very popular as a pumped dressing for dine-in customers. Ken’s and this side by side gets about a 60% vote for the US Foods brand. Go figure! I use only high end labels for pouches, though.

 

[famouspizza]

Nick,

What is your cost on pouches?

Packets are not an option for my market

I give 4oz, but I will try 3 1/4 instead of 4

2oz for a large salad would never fly with my customers…Do you guys give 1-2oz for a small and 2-2oz for a large?

 

[goomba]

famouspizza:

Nick,

What is your cost on pouches?

Packets are not an option for my market

I give 4oz, but I will try 3 1/4 instead of 4

2oz for a large salad would never fly with my customers…Do you guys give 1-2oz for a small and 2-2oz for a large?

     Famous,I use 2oz soufles on an 8''x8''x1-1/2deep clear cont.of romaine lettuce.And believe me it is plenty.And again if they want more you charge them,were in this business to make $$ not lose it my friend.I am in South Philly where the pizza businesses are here by the thousands and we get away w/ it so I'm sure you could also.But hey,If its in your heart to give away that much dressing for ea. salad then go right ahead.I'm just trying to save you a buck or more.

        Niccademo

 

[famouspizza]

Goomba,

I hear ya man about not giving it away…I just raised all my prices today across the board and I have always charged $.50 for extra dressing…every add on gets charged through my POS trust me.
I use 9" foil pans for my salads that might be deeper also…people always comment how big our salads are so maybe thats the difference b/c even though I think 4oz is good I would say about half our customers ask for extra.

Well one good thing that came of this is that extra blue cheese is now $.75!

 

[NicksPizza]

famouspizza:

Nick,

What is your cost on pouches?

Packets are not an option for my market

I give 4oz, but I will try 3 1/4 instead of 4

2oz for a large salad would never fly with my customers…Do you guys give 1-2oz for a small and 2-2oz for a large?

I pay a little high on these . . . about 17.5 cents to 19.5 cents for 1.5 ounce packets. It’s worth it for my convenience and food waste control. I stock 5 boxes, and it stays fine on my shelves . . . no gallons to worry about use by dates or spillage. Greek Dressing we still use a pump on a gallon as we haven’t found a good shelf stable pouch version yet.

I serve one with 5 ounces of lettuce and two with 8 ounces of lettuce. Customer buys more if they want it. I am in the business of dressing salads, and not immersing them. If they want some lettuce with their 100 Island dressing, they buy a couple more @ 50 cents each. And they do buy more :shock:

 

[Wing_Man]

Not sure about the salads but we built the chain on a 2oz cup for wings after dropping the 4oz cups. Just too much prep… ( wish I had that problem now :? )

We still use em here. One of the hardest food costs I had to teach again this time around was employees giving away extra cups of dressing. :x

We charge .40 for the extra bleu and ranch.
We use the US deluxe chunky bleu and the Ken’s homestyle racnh dressing. 50.39 -bleu .22 serving 35.40 ranch .17 serving

On a side note. My wife is the bleu cheese expert as she has always used it for salads. I only use it with wings That Bleu is Ken’s deluxe chunky with their label on it. Customers love both products and we give and get fellow western New Yorkers approval on the Bleu.

But I will tell you that the dressing will vary from Ken’s plant to plant where made. If you ever have a salesman tell you that it’s all the same it’s BS. We went round and round with Syco years ago on this.

After factory tours and talking with the Ken’s family we had to do the old blind taste test with them before they would admit that their two gallons of dressing from different plants tasted differently.

 

[15thStreetPizzaandPu]

We use a 2oz and a 4oz because we have small and large salads. They do cost but this should be considered when pricing out your menu. We have request for extra dressing and for a while we did not charge. 6 months ago we started charging .50 for the small and .75 for the large. I think we had maybe two people say something about the extra charge, other than that most understand.

 

[bodegahwy]

We use Newman’s Own packets that we buy through Sysco. Depending on the dressing they run about 25 cents. They are very well received and contribute to our high-end image. They are simple and mess free. Because they are perceived as better we can charge more for the salad.