Restaurant inventory management is at the heart of operations in a food outlet because the price and quality of the menu, thereby the profitability of the business, are directly linked to how well the items procured are utilised. Thus, apart from shrinkage reduction ─ preventing theft or minimising spoilage ─, inventory control involves:
- ● Optimising procurement by tracking inventory levels and the performance of each item
● Controlling the amount of each ingredient used in a recipe to balance the demand and quality of a dish with the cost of making it
● Tallying procurement against the use of stocks
● Determining the ROI of the total inventory
Decoding Inventory Management Challenges, Installing the Right Restaurant Management Suite
Given the importance of service time in restaurants or any outlet type in the F&B industry, tracking inventory use is easier said than done. If done manually, the process can be labour-intensive and time-consuming. Moreover, manual tracking (old-school data entry on a sheet/notebook while using kitchen ingredients) is error-prone, defeating the very purpose of inventory control.
Another bottleneck concerning inventory data accuracy is data silo. In many businesses, the restaurant management suite is fragmented, resulting in discrepancies between sales data in the POS software and procurement and replenishment data in the ERP software. Here, too, manual data entry can introduce errors. Hence, digitising restaurant inventory management tasks is vital for improving inventory accuracy. However, selecting a well-performing management platform and hardware may be challenging.
In terms of software, restaurant management systems, such as QPOS, which come with robust restaurant POS and ERP software, save the day by creating a single repository for business data that is updated in real-time. Curious to know more about our centralised restaurant management system?
Let’s explore how QPOS can enhance inventory accuracy with other management tools!
- The Role QPOS Plays in Verifying and Logging Inventory Post-Procurement
When stocks are procured, accurate entry is the first and one of the critical steps in restaurant inventory management. These two steps ensure that the new batch of ingredients is properly recorded in the ERP:
- ● Measuring the Raw Materials and Other Ingredients: While QPOS is hardware-agnostic and is compatible with any billing terminal, to create an end-to-end automatic inventory tracking infrastructure, a POS scale in the back of the house (cold storage and kitchen) is required. When selecting the POS scale, it is important to consider that the back-of-house POS terminal or a tablet, or any other device with QPOS installed is compatible with the scale. Once the procured items are weighed, the inventory module of the restaurant management system is instantly updated.
However, if one wants to eliminate all instances of manual data entry, then Vision AI-enabled scales can be used. These scales, powered by computer vision, are capable of automatically predicting or automatically recognising the product placed on them. Therefore, the product code input needed while using the POS scale is further eliminated, and the inventory update in the restaurant management system is made faster.
- ● Tally Procurement Measured with PO (Procurement Order): QPOS’s in-built AI capabilities include OCR (Optical Character Recognition). Therefore, when the image of a physical bill or PO is fed to the restaurant POS software, it automatically captures the data, doing away with yet another manual data entry process.
By comparing the PO data with that of the inventory measured, users can verify if the procurement has been fulfilled diligently by the vendor.
2 . Leveraging QPOS for Accurate Inventory Logging During Order Preparation
When an ingredient is measured for cooking, its final weight, confirmed on the POS scale, is automatically recorded in the restaurant management system. Thus, the quantity of ingredients that went into the order preparation in question is accurately accounted for without any manual intervention. Also, by eliminating manual entry during inventory logging, F&B players can reduce theft or negligence-driven shrinkage.
3. Analysing Inventory Utilisation and Shrinkage During Inventory Audits with QPOS
QPOS enables restaurant managers/owners to compare the sales made against the value of the ingredients used, thereby helping them complete a step in their profit analysis. The inventory utilisation calculation can be effortlessly completed by mapping the cost of ingredients used to the bill amount in the digital receipts recorded in QPOS. However, this is not the only aspect of inventory audit that the restaurant management system aids.
Inventory audits also involve conducting a quality check of the stock and counting inventory items. While quality checks are labour-intensive, a preliminary inventory count can be conducted daily.
A basic rule of thumb to maintain the quality and freshness of ingredients is to follow FIFO: First In, First Out. Thus, in general, when a batch of items is procured, it can be labelled as per its procurement date by mapping the date in the barcode or QR code on the batch. This label is generated when the batch is measured on the POS scale after the items are purchased.
With a simple barcode scanner, employees can perform a rudimentary inventory audit every day and optimise the use of each batch. It is worth noting when a new batch is used, the label can be scanned by the kitchen staff before ingredients are taken. This practice allows the restaurant POS to track the inventory level of the batch, thereby determining the inventory level of the entire stock, every time a certain quantity of the ingredient is used from the batch.
Any unaccounted difference in inventory level, after the audit is compared to the sales record, points to shrinkage (stolen inventory and spoilage).
4. Effortless Recipe Management with QPOS
With the recipe management module of QPOS, restaurant owners can create a quantified list of items used to make a recipe. This allows the business to discover the cost of preparing each dish and the profit margin on it. This module empowers decision-makers to plan sales better by optimising costs.
Cost optimisation also includes maximising the sales of food items or ingredients in the inventory that are at risk of spoiling. This module of the restaurant inventory management system creates the groundwork for innovating around surplus ingredients, aiding kitchen staff to brainstorm the chef’s special dishes for limited-time offers until the ingredients are used well.
5. Streamline Inventory Planning and Maximise ROI on Inventory with QPOS
QPOS has a reporting module, which is instrumental in enabling restaurants to keep a tab on the performance (ROI) of each item. The easy-to-understand dynamic charts that this module generates can be used to optimise the menu, plan inventory, and reduce wastage.
The restaurant POS comes with an AI-backed chatbot that powers on-demand data fetching and customised report creation, rendering decision-making easier than ever.
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