Keeping your restaurant well-stocked with food and beverages can be one of the most challenging aspects of running your business. If you do not have enough supplies, you may run out, which will leave your customers upset that they can not order their favorite menu items.

On the other hand, if you keep too much inventory on hand, it could be costing you time and money you do not need to spend just sitting around waiting to be sold.

Restaurant food inventory can be tricky, but it is important to make sure that your restaurant does not run out of food during its peak hours. If you run out of key ingredients, such as fish or chips, in the middle of service, the consequences can be severe and have an immediate impact on your bottom line.

At the same time, it is important to make sure that you maintain proper food storage conditions, such as maintaining the right temperature in your fridge and freezer units.

To help ensure that this does not happen to you, go through this Restaurant Inventory Management Guide.

What is food inventory management?

Inventory management is all about managing your storage in a way that allows you to keep your business running smoothly. It might sound pretty vague, but it is quite simple. To have a successful business, you need to make sure that you have enough stock on hand to meet demand while not overstocking and spending money unnecessarily on excess products. 

Depending on what kind of business you are running, inventory management can not be something you do once a month or every few hours. It is something that needs to be updated every second. Here are a few points you always need to keep in mind:

✓ Keep track of important inventory items

✓ Always have enough backup supplies

✓ Never run out of quality essentials

✓ Make sure you do not exceed the budgeted amounts for certain foods

✓ Conduct thorough inventory checks at least once a week

The benefits of food inventory management

It may seem obvious, but you will never have a complete list of your inventory unless you actively record it. And, recording it means doing more than just jot down what food is in stock—you need to keep track of how much you paid for each item when it was purchased and from whom or if it is past its expiration date. You even need to record when the product is removed from storage to know how long items have been out for sale and whether or not they need replacing. Without careful monitoring, wasted food will quickly add up to lost money, reduced profits, and unhappy customers who can not find what they want on your menu!

Keeping your inventory in check ensures that food is always on hand, especially if you are a restaurant or hospitality business. Benefits of food inventory management include:

• Prevent wastage and save money in the long run.
• Ensure you will have enough supplies to cover peak traffic times. 
• Happy customers because they would not have to wait for service.

Food inventory for loss prevention 

The purpose of the stock control software is to maintain accurate inventory records. This helps ensure that orders are placed for additional stock at optimal times, reducing stock-outs.

A standard way to do this is by tracking purchases and sales against actual demand. Using a stock control system helps enhance business practices, as it allows businesses to track changes in items over time, analyze supply chains for best pricing and improve customer service through increased availability. 

Businesses run at varying capacities, which means maintaining an accurate inventory can be challenging. Stock control systems help these businesses manage daily demand while improving efficiency and saving money in storage space costs and lost potential sales on out-of-stock items.

Further, understanding how you buy inventory and how sales relate helps you identify inventory lost for any of the following reasons: 

• Liquid spills
• Employee errors
• Staff meals usage
• Ingredient theft
• Satisfying disgruntled customers 

Important restaurant inventory terminology

Depletion — It is how much food was purchased, or pulled out, of sitting inventory. 

Usage — It is a measurement of how much product is consumed and can be used in figuring out how to adjust menus or recipes for improvement.

Allocation — It refers to how food is distributed among different work stations in a kitchen, such as one station making salads while another handles entrees. This requires careful record-keeping to make sure that proper amounts of all ingredients are being used. 

Diversion — It refers to taking food items from one purpose or menu section (such as an appetizer) and using them for another (like main courses). If not paid attention it can quickly deplete ingredient stocks if too much product is diverted for other purposes.

Variance accounts — It is for variance between what was ordered and what was used as well as leftovers being served (or saved) on different days. It is important to monitor variance as it helps you know whether to scale back on orders in an attempt to reduce supply costs or manage guest usage better via marketing campaigns like free tasting nights and low-cost items during certain hours.

Stock control systems or inventory management software — It helps enhance business practices. It keeps track of goods stored in a business and helps locate items that require replenishment, thus preventing shortages and ultimately helping in sales growth. 

Sitting inventory — It refers to products that are not purchased.

Take control of your stock with automated inventory management

Did you know?

You can take care of all your inventory management needs from a single platform. Maintain stock and restock when required for you never run out of essentials for your restaurants, bars, or cafes. With our restaurant inventory management software, you will be able to keep track of what is in stock and what is not. It allows you to create purchase orders on the go as well as view current pending orders. 

Users can make quick changes to their inventory levels, search items by name or description, or add new items to their database at any time, thanks to our intuitive dashboard.

Stocktake online helps you take control of your stock with automated inventory management, reduce waste, create reports, and plan future purchases. Our inventory management software makes managing all aspects of stock in one place easier than ever before! It has been designed for easy navigation across all devices. Prevent running out of stock while keeping a close watch on all your products, equipment, and ingredients in real-time!