Meals For Thought - Is Your Food And Refreshment Procedureprocess Being Dealt With Correctly?

I eat food. I consume beverages.

For that reason, I am certified to manage a Food and Beverage operation.

In assessing the operations of numerous clubs/resorts monthly, I find that one of the most poorly run, irregular locations of club/resort operations is Food and Beverage. Especially in member owned environments, which are typically managed by a club board, people seem to believe that due to the fact that they eat in restaurants, they somehow have some level of expertise that allows them to make organization decisions about this crucial element of the club. The reality is that this is one of the most complicated departments in a club to manage, control, and produce a consistent experience.

Let's ask a couple of concerns!

Is your Food and Drink experience suitable for what your members/guests wish to have in your club/resort? Are you priced appropriately, too expensive, or too low? How do you understand? Are you tracking cover counts by day? By shift? By hour?

Are your food choices stuck in yesteryear, a good balance of old favorites and brand-new choices, or edgy? Is your menu developed for function or style? Do you change your menu quarterly, or a minimum of semi-annually to keep it fresh? Or is it changed every year or more and end up being a club dinosaur? What are your item specifications and part sizes? Is every product on your menu costed? What is your goal for a la carte food expense? Do you know the contribution margin on every product on your menu?

What about your unique events. Are they actually special? Do they develop a buzz in the Club? Are they excitedly expected or the exact same thing that was done the last 10 years with nothing more than the year altered in the newsletter and marketing piece touting the occasion? Is your personnel challenged every quarter to try new events? Brand-new rate points?

Got Value?

What about worth included shows? It's taking place every day in the hospitality industry. Chili's, Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, Flemings, Cody's Roadhouse, McDonalds, Quiznos, Subway, and numerous other national franchises are actively setting to keep people coming in. Any wonder the success rate of franchises is over 90% while the success rate of separately owned restaurants has to do with 10%?

What are you doing in your club to produce a "WOW" for your members/guests in your Food and Beverage offerings? Are you standing pat on your $32 filet and $28 sea bass wondering why you are doing so couple of covers? Or, are you trying brand-new concepts that may offer "meal replacement" dining rather of just "unique event" dining?

Something as easy as Pleased Hour can create extra use. Home cooking such as meatloaf, chicken casserole, lasagna, or comparable for" at $8 or $9 throughout the week are popular. Taco bars, pasta bars, burger night, half cost on bottles of home wine, Fresh Fish Fridays or a Friday Fish Fry, a Chef's selection at a special cost on slower evenings, sushi nights, appetizers at a special cost, home entertainment, and lots of other principles and events drive use, supply incremental earnings, and keep the personnel working. Are you try out brand-new events in your club/resort? Provide it a try. You'll be shocked at the buzz it produces.

The Experience

How is your dining room presented? With white table linens? No table linens? Placemats? Are you charging appropriately for the experience you are offering?

How are your buffets provided? Elegantly with skirting, floral screens, and glossy silver chafing meals? Or fundamental with little or no frills? Does it make good sense?

Do you have standards of operation to make sure the food and beverage experience for your members/guests? Is every employee using a tidy and pushed designated uniform? Exists a particular way to present menus, serve, food, mixed drinks, and white wine? Are members called by name? Specify actions of service in place?

Does the service staff know the structure of every item, sauce, and portion size from the menu? Is training provided at least monthly? Is your personnel offering suggestively?

The Technical Aspects

How typically do you take a physical stock? Is there "self-reliance" in the stock procedure to guarantee that the counts are accurate? Is inventory prices changed routinely to reflect the most current expense the club is paying for all inventoried products or is the expense the club paid in 2015 still being used to figure out stock worth?

Do you follow this mantra when getting and inventorying items?

If you buy it by the pound, weigh it. If you purchase it by the piece, count it. If you buy it by ounce or length, measure it? Under no scenarios, accept it blindly.

I am amazed at how frequently shipments are accepted and signed for without even physically remaining in the very same space as the products that were provided let alone checking the packing slip or billing against the goods received. Delivery individuals become smart very quickly to those who hold them responsible and those who don't. A few pounds of missing out on steak here or a few bottles of missing out on alcohol there costs a lot of money over a prolonged period of time.

Just how much unusable food is stored in the freezer, frequently a chef's best friend, and continues to be counted on a monthly basis during stock yet is basically worth little or absolutely nothing?

What does the organizational structure appear like in your club's F&B operation? How are your managers compensated? Are they incented to produce a particular monetary result, train the personnel, and preserve food & beverage manufacturing standards? Or are they paid just for showing up?

How is your service staff paid? By per hour wage? Suggestion pool? Some mix of both? Does your pay structure promote tenure or turnover? What about overtime? Are you paying overtime? Legally?

In addition to costing every item on every menu, have you done the very same for alcohol, beer, and white wine? Do you have defined put sizes? Are they being adhered to? Do you have pourers which allow only for the put size for which you are charging? Just how much of your club's resort's cash is tied up in wine inventory? Have you recognized par stocks?

Do you have a Food and Beverage minimum? Does it make sense for your club? Do you have a minimum month-to-month service fee? Should you?

Do you offer a worker meal? How is it represented? Is it accounted for at all? Do you enable staff members to get rid of food/beverage from the club? (A bad idea!). Do you enable your employees to consume liquors at the end of a shift? (An even worse idea!!).

Personal Events

What about your Private Occasions? Is your catering menu priced right? What does priced ideal mean? Have you evaluated the competitive environment? What are you doing to bring wedding events and meetings to the club/resort? Are you covering the expenses of setting up and breaking down every space based upon the varying needs of each event?

Do your personal occasion policies make good sense? When is the "guarantee' due? When is payment completely required? Do you need a signed contract? Do you even have a contract that you require be signed?

A Service

Great deals of questions! Get a management business that will work collaboratively with you to address all of these and any others and develop a personalized food and beverage experience that reflects your special scenario and provides what your members/guests desire and want to spend for.