labor cost??

[Nate]

Our sales fluctuate between $4000 Monday’s and $9000 Saturday’s. We average about 1 driver for every $500 in sales. They all work varying schedules obviously. Peak times 4:30pm- 8:30pm we’ll have approx 8-12 drivers, 3 cooks, 2 cut and box, 1 float and 1 kitchen manager . Our town is roughly 165,000 people and includes a major university. Target delivery times are under an hour, we don’t quote times! There are points in the city where it can take our drivers 25-30 minutes to get there. These deliveries are very difficult to keep under an hour.

 

[durbancic]

Can you give an estimation of your delivery area size? How many miles each direction, how many minutes to get to your farthest point and if possible how many square miles do you cover?

We deliver appx 4 miles in each direction, some parts is about 3, some 4.5 miles (at the furthest). when we created our delivery area we set it up by drivetime zone (easily done with microsoft streets and trips) and the majority of our delivery area is 8 minutes max. Some parts are a little bit more, but that is about it.
Our delivery perimeter is 27 miles and our delivery area is 36 square miles, according to google earth. Anyone else?

 

[d9phoenix]

My delivery area is setup for 10 minutes drive time under normal conditions. That way 25 minute round trip for my day driver (10 their, 5 at the door, 10 back).

 

[314]

I used to push for low in-store labor (Managers, Drivers & Cooks) of 18-20%.

I have since switched that around a bit, I now expect 22-24% IN STORE as I am now relocating money once spent on advertising into staffing more drivers and cooks so as to ensure better service which the way better ROI than any advertising I could put out. With the average delivery time now 22 minutes (14 minutes out the door is our goal) with most of my areas having a 7 minute drive. Scheduling an extra driver each shift (or more) does not cost that much and actually helps run lower labor on busy nights since we dont get behind any more. We rate 4 deliveries an hour per driver but I have many that exceed that if we are getting the food through the oven fast enough and mistakes are kept at a minimum.

My prep is another 2%. Trying to be UNDER 30% on a P&L with taxes added…and my owner pay is not included.

 

[pizzapiratespp]

Here’s my issue and why I’m always asking everyone about this when the subject arises.

I set up all of our locations pretty much the same as everyone else. 7 to 10 minutes out with a couple of spots that might take a minute or 2 more. 1 driver for every 3 to 4 deliveries per hour. It all works great. But our 1 store which was set up like this 20 years ago has a much bigger delivery area. Somewhere in the 70 square mile range. It worked for us then, because the roads were so wide open, very few stop signs, signals and traffic. Fast forward 20 years and we have stop signs, signals and crazy traffic all over the place. We have points where a 20 minute round trip is now 40 minutes. 40 minutes doesn’t work. We are looking at 35% labor just for the driver. The store is busy so multiple deliveries per run is common. Each driver leaves with an average of 2.3 deliveries per run.

So I have come to the point where we either have to shrink our delivery area and cut out customers that have been regular customers for 20 years. Or just bite the bullet and have a loaded up driver staff all the time to keep delivery times in a reasonable time. Our other stores average about 33 minutes to the door. This store cant get under 40 even on a good day. I’m leaning toward having the extra driver set up for a few months and just see how it goes.

 

[GotRocks]

Here’s my issue and why I’m always asking everyone about this when the subject arises.

I set up all of our locations pretty much the same as everyone else. 7 to 10 minutes out with a couple of spots that might take a minute or 2 more. 1 driver for every 3 to 4 deliveries per hour. It all works great. But our 1 store which was set up like this 20 years ago has a much bigger delivery area. Somewhere in the 70 square mile range. It worked for us then, because the roads were so wide open, very few stop signs, signals and traffic. Fast forward 20 years and we have stop signs, signals and crazy traffic all over the place. We have points where a 20 minute round trip is now 40 minutes. 40 minutes doesn’t work. We are looking at 35% labor just for the driver. The store is busy so multiple deliveries per run is common. Each driver leaves with an average of 2.3 deliveries per run.

So I have come to the point where we either have to shrink our delivery area and cut out customers that have been regular customers for 20 years. Or just bite the bullet and have a loaded up driver staff all the time to keep delivery times in a reasonable time. Our other stores average about 33 minutes to the door. This store cant get under 40 even on a good day. I’m leaning toward having the extra driver set up for a few months and just see how it goes.

I’m just throwing this out there, but would opening another location somewhat nearby to meet demand, and shorten drive times be feasible? I haven’t looked at your website or anything to know your operation well, I’ve just being going off your posts to get an idea of your business, do I dare say “Your Empire”?
It seems like you’re kicking butt and taking names, maybe a smaller express location a few miles away to take those deliveries.
Just thinking out loud here…

 

[pizzapiratespp]

I’m just throwing this out there, but would opening another location somewhat nearby to meet demand, and shorten drive times be feasible? I haven’t looked at your website or anything to know your operation well, I’ve just being going off your posts to get an idea of your business, do I dare say “Your Empire”?
It seems like you’re kicking butt and taking names, maybe a smaller express location a few miles away to take those deliveries.
Just thinking out loud here…

I think you are 100% correct.

 

[velvet]

I used to push for low in-store labor (Managers, Drivers & Cooks) of 18-20%.

I have since switched that around a bit, I now expect 22-24% IN STORE as I am now relocating money once spent on advertising into staffing more drivers and cooks so as to ensure better service which the way better ROI than any advertising I could put out. With the average delivery time now 22 minutes (14 minutes out the door is our goal) with most of my areas having a 7 minute drive. Scheduling an extra driver each shift (or more) does not cost that much and actually helps run lower labor on busy nights since we dont get behind any more. We rate 4 deliveries an hour per driver but I have many that exceed that if we are getting the food through the oven fast enough and mistakes are kept at a minimum.

My prep is another 2%. Trying to be UNDER 30% on a P&L with taxes added…and my owner pay is not included.

22 minutes deliveries thats fast!- some of our deliveries are about that time but in any given busy dinner or even lunch it is more like 40-50 minutes… Most pizza places i worked for run about same time on any busier than usually dinner/lunch.

 

[bodegahwy]

I shoot for 19 minutes as an average door time which puts us at the customer around 25-30 minutes. Busy nights, like last night, we ran 21 minutes. Only orders with deep dish were running longer than 40 minutes to the door.

Holiday week was another story though. We were running at an hour during dinner… and having customers tell us the other places they called were quoting 2-3 hours.

 

[pizzapiratespp]

We run 20 min average out the door time with 10 minute average on the road time. Total of 30 minute delivery time. This is at our average volume stores. They will get busy at times, fall apart and end up in the 45 to 60 minute range at times though. The busier store will average 20 minutes out the door but with a 19 minute on the road average making the average delivery time around 40 minutes. We do good sales there and people keep coming back. Right now we are floating around 30% up from last year. But I do wonder if sometimes people are passing on us because they don’t want to wait.

 

[Bradley_Watson]

Hi everyone…I see this is an old thread, but hoping someone can answer. This is exactly the discussion I wanted some help on, but I’m in Australia, so % is not comparable becasue of the differences in wages, and menu prices. Can anyone tell me what is realistic in terms of hours e.g. number of pizzas per hour (production staff), number of pizzas per hour (service staff), number of dough balls per hour (production), number of pizzas per hour (prep production).
…or perhaps there is another way to look at it?

 

[d9phoenix]

There are a couple people on this board who are also in Australia, i am sure they could help you out.

 

[URNUTS]

My only experience is Domino’s but my goal was always 30% food and 20% labor.
Food was usually 25-27% and labor was usually 18-20.
And, the labor becomes tough because of how we all do things- are you counted in labor, how do you get paid, etc so that can skew the numbers and make them seem great when they are not.
Or at least make comparisons difficult.

 

[paul7979]

My only experience is Domino’s but my goal was always 30% food and 20% labor.
Food was usually 25-27% and labor was usually 18-20.
And, the labor becomes tough because of how we all do things- are you counted in labor, how do you get paid, etc so that can skew the numbers and make them seem great when they are not.
Or at least make comparisons difficult.

URNUTS, I’d like to pick your brain a bit about this 18-20% labor. I’ve heard these numbers before from other Dominos managers and I struggle to figure out how they can run such tight labor. Would you mind discussing how yours was calculated? Taxes and workers comp included? Management included? What would a typical day look like on the schedule?

It’s my understanding that the average Domino’s is now doing nearly $900,000 annually. 20% for labor is $180,000. After paying a GM $35,000(a very low wage in my mind) there’s $145,000 left, or about $400 per day. With the average Domino’s open 11+ hours a day, I just can’t see how they can schedule to make that 20% goal. I’m doing double the sales but struggle to run 32% labor(after subtracting out myself and my wifes payroll) including taxes and workers comp. We have a few hours of prep everyday that Domino’s doesn’t(dough, cheese, veggies ect) but even without those hours, I can’t even begin to imagine a schedule that would yeild a 20% labor and still give even borderline acceptable customer service.

 

[URNUTS]

Well, like much of what we discuss, so many variables.
20% labor did not include WC and taxes- just the actual labor cost.
Some stores run a pretty tight ship on labor, others not so much.
When I started back in the early 80’s, the minute the rush ended- BAM! All rush drivers GONE ASAP!
I did a lot of cross-training so I didn’t need have 3 inside and 3 in the road but could get by with 2 and 2.
Also, not sure where managers are making that $35K- most I know are in the $55-85K range.
Another factor is carry-out. My last store was 55% C/O- that’s a less labor-intensive category.
That’s all for now… I’ll keep thinking.

 

[paul7979]

I used the 35K manager in the example to to try to make the numbers easier to make sense. With a manager making 55K out of the 180K total annual payroll, there’s not much left to pay assistants, pizza makers drivers ect. If a store is open 11AM til 10Pm, scheduling 2 instore and 2 drivers will more than eat up 100% of the remainder. Obviously the manager will be working some of those hours, but there’s not much room for rush drivers. We’re 80+% delivery so total drivers payroll is pretty similar to my instore payroll. Once I build my new building, I’ll be much better set up to push carryout. I appreciate the feedback as it’s been 20 years since I’ve worked under someone elses system and it’s hard to remember back that far.

 

[pizzapiratespp]

Hi everyone…I see this is an old thread, but hoping someone can answer. This is exactly the discussion I wanted some help on, but I’m in Australia, so % is not comparable becasue of the differences in wages, and menu prices. Can anyone tell me what is realistic in terms of hours e.g. number of pizzas per hour (production staff), number of pizzas per hour (service staff), number of dough balls per hour (production), number of pizzas per hour (prep production).
…or perhaps there is another way to look at it?

In California right now we are running about 34%. That’s all labor and labor related expenses. Minimum wage is $10.50 but our average inside or driver is around $12. We will be close to Australia type wages here in the next few years. According to my spreadsheets we will need to increase prices by 20%. Our labor will go from 34% to around 38%. Food cost % should drop 2% and margins will drop 2%.

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[URNUTS]

Understood, Paul. I was just trying to throw out whatever relevant info I could.
It’s complicated stuff and, quite frankly, the number of variables and the different reporting/management styles make drawing conclusion tough, Other than some basic fundamentals such as wages and such.

 

[Joe]

In California right now we are running about 34%. That’s all labor and labor related expenses. Minimum wage is $10.50 but our average inside or driver is around $12. We will be close to Australia type wages here in the next few years. According to my spreadsheets we will need to increase prices by 20%. Our labor will go from 34% to around 38%. Food cost % should drop 2% and margins will drop 2%.

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Just raised mine today. Warriors playoffs alone is yuge for us. Plus baseball (cubs of course!) is back. Graduation coming. Min wage set to go up to $14/hour in July.

 

[pizzapiratespp]

Just raised mine today. Warriors playoffs alone is yuge for us. Plus baseball (cubs of course!) is back. Graduation coming. Min wage set to go up to $14/hour in July.

I have my increases planned a couple of months ahead of the increases also. I’m going up $1 a pizza in October.

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