More foodservice operators are looking for tech-driven support to manage their inventory this year. A recent report from Savor said restaurants are increasingly looking for smart sourcing platforms that can help them navigate supply chain challenges, whether they relate to minimizing waste or managing potential tariff impacts. These platforms can help operators quickly identify alternative ingredients when prices spike or availability becomes limited, while enabling operators to maintain quality and consistency in their offerings. These platforms are also a means of future-proofing an operation. According to a recent report from Hospitality Net, smart sourcing platforms can provide operators with a holistic view of their expenses. This allows them to pinpoint areas where they might reduce costs and waste – and thereby improve their adaptability to market fluctuations and strengthen their position for future expansion.

The average restaurant wastes 4-10 percent of their purchased food, according to a study by the National Restaurant Association. Foodservice operators who conduct weekly inventory turnover calculations tend to uncover sources of waste, save time and boost their bottom line – and automated inventory management is becoming a commonly used tool to help with this process. But before operators can draw reliable information about their inventory, they need to first understand their menu inside and out – what equipment they need for each item, what ingredients are critical and which can serve as substitutes, how to standardize recipes across locations where specialty ingredients may differ, and where there might be opportunities to innovate, for example. Technology is helpful here too. Modern Restaurant Management reported recently that the bakery chain Le Pain Quotidien adopted an AI tool that serves as a clone of its founding chef, Alain Coumont. The tool, which they call Alain.AI, is used by the bakery’s locations around the world to standardize recipes and get help developing the menu. It has compiled the bakery’s 10,000 historic and current recipes into a closed database that the team can use to develop new recipes more efficiently. Going forward, they plan to plug food and beverage trends into the database so they can develop recipes that reflect those trends, as well as create clones of consumers to better understand and support their food and drink preferences. Tech-driven tools that support recipe consistency and menu management are becoming increasingly common – and can help you ensure that your business prepares a dish to the same high standard each time, all while providing the foundation for you to better manage inventory costs from there. Looking at your database of recipes, how consistently do you include elements such as your yield, portion size, ingredients, mise en place, cooking instructions and methods, plating instructions, photos and other information that ensures consistency?

For every dollar a restaurant invests in food waste reduction, it generates $8 in savings, according to the World Resources Institute.   In a business of slim margins, that can add up to significant savings – and that’s just counting food waste. Are there areas of your operation where waste management in general could be better? Your technology can help you identify and manage them on an ongoing basis. Start with your food and the other supplies you need to serve guests and run your business. Your inventory management system can help you improve your order precision and ingredient use so you avoid spoilage and can more readily identify when theft occurs – or be alerted in the moment if there has been a run on a particular supply. Using tech tools to manage portions (and measure discarded ingredients) can help you ensure your staff, regardless of how long they have been working in the business, are serving dishes of a consistent size and using ingredients tip-to-tail. Energy waste can generate significant expense too – one study found that 45-70 percent of electricity is wasted in commercial kitchens due to insufficient training and poor equipment maintenance, for example.  Tech-based training and digital maintenance logs can help you manage that waste and alert you to potential problems. Beyond that, consider energy-efficient lighting and equipment, as well as sensor-monitored equipment that can be controlled remotely and also help you monitor malfunctioning appliances before they become a problem that generates significant waste.

Your ability to manage what’s happening at the back of the house – and particularly the ingredients that you have available – can make as much of a difference to your guest experience as a streamlined ordering and payment process. Your inventory management tools should help you communicate in real time about what you are able to serve guests and what items shouldn’t be advertised for sale. At the same time, it should empower you to stay a step ahead of such events so you’re not often in the position of having to tell guests you’re out of the dish they specifically came to your restaurant to enjoy. While being able to fulfill a guest’s anticipated order won’t necessarily build their loyalty, not having that dish will certainly chip away at it.

Is there room for you to remove manual processes from your inventory management? Adopting an automated inventory management system that integrates with your POS can help your business more quickly identify problems that waste resources. You can remove human error from the ordering process, forecast your needs more accurately, lower your food costs, and more quickly pinpoint where you’re experiencing product theft, breakage, spoilage or other waste. Having real-time information at your fingertips simply makes you nimble. As this report from Restaurant Technology News indicates, these tools help you monitor stock levels and their corresponding value in real time, which helps you calculate recipe costs and ensure you’re offering a profitable combination of items as you swap ingredients in and out.

​As restaurant operators know, money is made at the back of the house. The steps you take to get a better handle on everything from portioning food to managing inventory translate into important savings. Adopting tools to monitor waste is a big one. Research from the Natural Resources Defense Council estimated that 22-33 billion pounds of food is wasted by restaurants every year, with about 7 percent of it wasted before it even reaches the customer. To get a better handle on how much food you’re wasting, you have to track all possible sources of it. A report from The Rail advises operators to have staff keep a log – ideally a mobile app connected with your inventory management software – of every instance of spills, misfires, burned or ruined orders, spoiled or expired ingredients, comped meals, theft, and scraps from paring, cutting or butchering. Patterns may emerge from this that allow you to zero in on the habits and practices that generate waste for you.

There is a lot of waste – and therefore money – that can hide in your inventory. The topic loomed large in a recent survey of restaurant operators by the National Restaurant Association and the accounting software provider Sage Intacct. Inventory management systems rose to the top of the list of technologies restaurant operators are looking to implement in the next one to two years. The responses represent an evolution from how operators were feeling in the middle of the pandemic, when delivery apps and QR codes jumped in popularity. Regardless of the times, being able to manage your inventory with greater precision can be a significant boost to your efficiency. It can help you tighten up your menu and ensure that every ingredient you have on hand is pulling its weight in terms of profitability and popularity. At the same time, it can minimize the space you need to store what you serve, the amount of food coming back to the kitchen untouched, and the scraps you have to discard.

If there is a silver lining to the past couple of years in the restaurant industry, it could be that operators have become significantly more nimble. Technology has supported this transition, enabling restaurants to monitor and measure everything from ingredient waste to menu profitability. Expect even more fine-tuning as restaurants continue to manage steep operating costs. That will include greater precision when it comes to not just ingredient use, but also the prediction of exactly what ingredients a restaurant will need in the near future. Chipotle, for one, is piloting a “cook-to-needs” kitchen management system in select California stores that provides demand-based cooking and ingredient preparation forecasts, according to a Restaurant Technology News report. The goal of the system is to help each restaurant make the most of its ordered ingredients, maximize freshness and minimise food waste. The report said the system uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to monitor ingredient levels in real time, then notifies the team how much to prepare, cook and when to start cooking. This information then feeds data collection that supports real-time production planning for each restaurant.

Even if you have already embraced digital ordering, QR codes and other front-of-house technology to help your operation run more smoothly, your kitchen may still look like it did a decade ago. The Spoon predicts the digitization of the restaurant kitchen will take off this year, enabling restaurants to run more nimbly and, by extension, better manage labor, monitor inventory and portion sizes, and reduce waste. Powerhouse Dynamics and Perfect Company are just a couple of the players bringing more real-time management and automation to the back of the house. Do you currently use just-in-time tools in your kitchen that allow you to flex in the moment with what’s happening in your business?

Restaurant employee theft is a common problem, accounting for 75 percent of inventory shortages and 4 percent sales, according to the National Restaurant Association. Your systems and tools can help you stop it soon after it starts – or even prevent it altogether. A TouchBistro report advises leaning on your POS for help. For example, your POS settings can help you place controls on what employees can do when placing orders – such as preventing the printing of a bill if an order has not actually been served, or the deletion of items on a bill before it is closed and then keeping the cash. Your POS reports can also help you investigate questionable activity by flagging transactions that were removed or modified after they were finalized and those that involved voids or discounts, and scrutinizing day-end reconciliations that create an opportunity for underreporting earnings. It can show you how many times a cash drawer was opened and by whom, so you can quickly identify the employees to speak to in the event of a shortage. It can also identify discrepancies between an employee’s scheduled hours and how many hours they are reporting. Beyond your POS, consider the use of cameras at your POS and inventory storage areas, which can help you send the message that you’re committed to keeping everybody honest.