How to run a restaurant: the complete owner’s guide

How do you run a restaurant well?

In a restaurant, the days are taken up by service. Management often comes second, until a problem shows up: a loss-making month, a supplier who raised prices without anyone noticing, an employee who leaves in peak season, a poorly prepared hygiene inspection. Almost all of these problems can be seen coming with a few figures checked every week.

This guide goes through the six subjects, with what to track, the common mistakes and the detailed guide to read for each. At the end you will find a daily, weekly and monthly routine to print. If you have not opened yet, start with opening a restaurant; if you want to grow the business, read growing a restaurant next.

Which figures show whether your restaurant is profitable?

There is no need to track fifty indicators. Five figures are enough to steer a restaurant, as long as you look at them regularly and compare one period with another.

An example to read these figures

Take a fictional restaurant that turns over €30,000 before VAT in a month for 1,250 covers. Its average spend is 30,000 ÷ 1,250 = €24. The cost of food used (opening stock + purchases − closing stock) is €8,700: its food cost is 29%. Staff cost €10,500 including employer charges: 35%. Together, food and staff take 64% of turnover. That leaves 36% to pay rent, energy, insurance, loan repayments, and to make a profit.

These figures come from your till: it must be reliable, meet the French tax rules and be set up properly (VAT rates, tables, payment methods). See restaurant tills and POS in France.

These percentages only make sense when compared: with your previous months, with your business plan, and with what your accountant considers sustainable for your business. A two-point rise in food cost in a month should raise a question: supplier price, portions, waste, or theft?

Break-even, reading your accounts and the levers to improve margin: restaurant profitability. Dish-by-dish costing: food cost and menu pricing.

How do you build a profitable menu?

The menu is both your shop window and your first management tool. A menu that is too long multiplies purchases, waste and kitchen work; a well-built one puts forward the dishes customers love and that earn you money.

• Every dish has a recipe card: ingredients, weights, cost, selling price, margin in euros.
• Ingredients are shared between several dishes to limit stock lines and waste.
• Dishes that sell well and earn well are placed where the eye lands first.
• Dishes that sell little and earn little are reworked or removed at the next menu change.
• Descriptions are short and concrete; prices are aligned, without a currency sign that draws the eye to the price.
• In France, mandatory information (prices including service, origin of beef, allergen information available) is present.

How to build and write the menu: restaurant menu design. To set each price: food cost and menu pricing. To put it on Google: adding your menu to your Google listing.

How do you manage purchasing, stock and waste?

Purchases are one of a restaurant’s biggest costs, and stock is money sitting in your fridges. Three habits change everything.

1. Take stock regularly

Without a stocktake, you cannot know your real food cost. A full stocktake every month, and a quick count of expensive items every week, are enough for most restaurants. Always count in the same places, in the same order, with the same sheet.

2. Store so that what expires first is used first

“First in, first out” (and, for dated products, “first expired, first out”) stops you throwing away products forgotten at the back of the cold room. It needs disciplined storage and dated labels.

3. Order as precisely as possible

Start from sales in previous weeks, your bookings and the weather, and set a minimum and maximum stock for each product. “Just in case” orders often end up in the bin.

Choosing suppliers well (price, quality, reliability, payment terms) matters as much as storing well: see how to choose restaurant suppliers.

Step by step with a stocktake sheet: restaurant inventory management. The rules in France (food waste sorting, containers for leftovers) and practical ideas to waste less: reducing restaurant food waste.

How do you keep on top of hygiene and allergens?

Hygiene is not decided on inspection day, but in the actions of every service. The rules rest on a simple principle: identify the moments when food can become dangerous (delivery, storage, cooking, cooling, reheating, service) and monitor them.

• Written procedures known by the whole team: cleaning, temperatures, deliveries, traceability.
• Records kept up to date: temperatures of fridges, cold rooms and cooling.
• Simple traceability: labels and delivery notes kept, opened products dated.
• Training for new staff from their first day.
• Information on the 14 regulated allergens available for every dish, and a team that knows how to answer.

The French rules in detail, the HACCP method explained simply and a temperature log template: food hygiene and HACCP in a French restaurant. For allergens: the allergen matrix template.

How do you hire and organise your team?

Restaurants struggle to hire and keep staff. Those that cope best do not always pay more: they hire methodically, welcome newcomers well and make predictable rotas.

Hiring

A clear job description (duties, hours, pay, days off), an honest advert posted where candidates are (job sites, social media, catering schools, word of mouth from your team) and a trial shift in real conditions are worth more than a long interview. In France, hiring formalities (pre-hiring declaration, contract, medical check) are done before or on arrival. Step by step with an advert template: hiring restaurant staff.

Organising the rota

The rota must follow the activity (more staff on Saturday night than on Tuesday lunchtime), respect labour law and, in France, the collective agreement for hotels, cafés and restaurants, and be known in advance by the team. A rota announced late or constantly changed is one of the main reasons staff leave. The method and the rules to check: restaurant staff scheduling.

Your bookings are your best rota tool: knowing on Wednesday how many covers are booked for Saturday lets you adjust the team beforehand, not in the middle of the rush.

How do you manage bookings and reduce no-shows?

A booked table left empty on a Saturday night is lost turnover you never get back. Customers who do not turn up without warning are a real issue for restaurants, and a few simple rules cut their number a lot.

• Take a phone number and an email address with every booking.
• Send a confirmation straight away, then a reminder the day before with an easy way to cancel.
• Show your cancellation policy (notice period, possible deposit for large tables or busy nights).
• Keep a waiting list to fill the tables that free up.
• Note repeated no-shows in your customer list.

Cancellation policy templates and the rules on deposits are in the booking cancellation policy guide. To compare booking tools, see online booking with no commission.

How do you keep customers and look after your reputation?

A customer who comes back is the most profitable of all: they know the place, order with confidence and talk about it. Building loyalty does not take big budgets, but it does take consistency.

• Recognise regulars: their name, their table, their habits, noted in a customer list.
• Give them a reason to come back: new menu, themed evening, a gesture for a birthday.
• Stay in touch with their consent: an occasional newsletter, social media.
• Ask happy customers for a Google review at the right moment, without offering anything in exchange for their rating.
• Reply to every review, positive or negative, calmly and politely.

Methods specific to restaurants: restaurant customer loyalty. For reviews: getting more Google reviews for a restaurant and replying to Google reviews.

What are the most common management mistakes?

The same mistakes come up in many restaurants, whatever their size. None is serious if spotted early; all are expensive if left to run.

A good habit: once a month, take an hour, alone or with your accountant, to go through this table and your figures. Write down one single action for the following month, and check the month after that it was done. It is often more useful than a big overhaul once a year.

Where to start if everything feels urgent

If you are taking over the management of a restaurant that has none of this in place, do not try to fix everything in one week. Start with the figures: one month of daily turnover and covers, then a first stocktake. Next, update the recipe cards for your ten best-selling dishes. Then set up a rota published a week in advance. Finally, start replying to reviews. Within three months, the restaurant is run on facts rather than feelings, and each new topic becomes easier to handle.

The management routine: daily, weekly, monthly

Here is a short routine to adapt to your restaurant. Print it and put it up in the office: what is written down gets done more easily.

When this routine is running, you have time for the next stage: attracting new customers, raising average spend, launching takeaway or events. That is the subject of growing a restaurant.

The restaurant owner’s guide

Open, run, grow: each stage has its full guide and detailed guides, with their reading time.

This guide for your trade

• Restaurants
• Bars and cafés
• Restaurant booking

Go further

• How to open a restaurant in France
• How to grow a restaurant
• Restaurant CRM: your customer list
• Restaurant booking software with no commission
• Booking cancellation policy templates