inexpensive buffet items

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pizzabarntn

New member
ready to start doing my lunch buffet was planing on pizza,spagetti,breadsticks,salad but not crazy about the pizza what else are you guys doing on your buffets? besides pizza
 
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You may want to consider something sweet for dessert… brownies, cookies, cinnamon rolls, jello, etc.
 
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people are going to expect pizza at a pizza place. you can try 1/4 subs, cinnamon sticks, stuffed pizza, mac and cheese, pepperoni roll-ups. A place in Oregon that has a great pizza buffet has fried chicken, spuds, stuff like that. You can look at their website. The pizza place is called Izzy’s Pizza. It will depend on your customer flow, you don’t want alot of food out other wise it will look bad after awhile.
 
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having a fair amount of buffet experience, I can only hope you generate enough “butts-in-chairs” 2 make it worth while…do the math 1st…will you do 100 people? and @ what price-point…$4.99/$5.99…so, you can guesstimate your gross…so what will the food cost be? 40%? 50%?..is it really worth it?

CiCi’s does a hellava job, but they push thru the #'s
 
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Aren’t you the one who also has some BBQ?

How about some pulled pork and buns set out? Not sure how much that costs you, though.

Pizza and breadsticks and spaghetti are good staples…but, people do tend to over-eat and waste.

Also, there’s the “tact” to consider. Will you have a 3 slice limit per trip (so everyone can get a chance at fresh food) or let people just go whole hog?

I know as a customer, the thing I hate to see the most on a buffet is that I’ve waited in line and just paid, and then a group of construction workers comes in without paying up front, and beats everyone to the fresh pies because we’ve waited in line, gotten our sodas, etc…and we have the “left overs” until new comes up…and then here you go…they go right up again, taking 6 or more slices per plate.

If you don’t have much business at the start, you can lose some money because your pies really shouldn’t sit longer than 30 mins at the most. I know many places stretch that…but 30 mins…and it just gets old and crusty…no matter how well made.
 
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When I worked for Sbarros and Villa Pizza, our food set out like a buffet, except we served them and they paid by the slice. In our county, there’s a 3 hour hold time on pizza allowed by the health department. Not that we left it out for 3 hours, it became a judgement call. If it looked bad or the crust had dried out, it was pulled.
 
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Patriot'sPizza:
having a fair amount of buffet experience, I can only hope you generate enough “butts-in-chairs” 2 make it worth while…do the math 1st…will you do 100 people? and @ what price-point…$4.99/$5.99…so, you can guesstimate your gross…so what will the food cost be? 40%? 50%?..is it really worth it?
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I talked to a CiCi’s manager and he says they’re supposed to run 28%. He was complaining that they were running 33%. Just food for thought.
 
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a volume CiCi’s can run good #'s, but remember, all they serve is pasta w/two sauces…10-12 pizza varieties (12"), a few tossed salads, cinnamon rolls, brownies & a dessert pizza…some operations might vary a bit, but not much…

the CiCi’s I ran was one of the top 10 in the system…running 1000-1500+ butts-in-chairs nightly…with those #'s. its easier 2 make $$$ vrs. 75 people/day

volume cures all ills…
 
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Patriot'sPizza:
volume cures all ills…
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Even bad taste it seems. Man, people will stuff themselves on that garbage. Hey, I used to do it too when I was outta work. Had to keep my girlish figure.
 
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My daughter LOVES CiCi’s. I finally figured out why (since I make pizza at home and it’s FAR superior, IMHO)… she wants something out of the “trinket” machines. She will pick restaurants on the trinkets and such available.
 
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