How long will the supplies you currently have in your freezer last you before you need to call in a new order? Does your team fill out logs regularly? How are you keeping track of everything happening in your business?
When some people imagine opening up a restaurant, they don't think about the technical side of it all. However, there's a lot more that goes into restaurant management, such as keeping an inventory, managing your staff, and holding yourself accountable. Doing all of this on your own is difficult, especially if you lack the best restaurant software and proper training.
Here's why you may need to invest in one of the many types of software built for restaurant management.
Why You May Need Restaurant Software
Your restaurant could have the best food and chefs in town, but it won't matter much if you don't treat it like a business. Cooking may be your hobby, but enjoying the work doesn't mean you'll automatically find success.
One of the tools that make running a business much easier is restaurant software. The best restaurant software can take many forms, but they all make it that much easier to maintain your operations.
For example, an issue all restaurants have is managing their food inventory. When do you arrange orders for new supplies? How do you make sure food or drinks aren't going bad in the store room?
Food and beverage management software helps you keep tabs on your supplies. You can keep up-to-date inventory logs, monitor food temperature, and more. It all helps to cycle out food that's gone bad and keep fresh items stocked.
What the Best Restaurant Software Offers
The best software is that which was made by restaurant professionals for other restaurant professionals. It should be easy to set up and customize to your own needs. These are some of the different features you can expect from investing in restaurant software.
Real-Time Reporting
The first feature to keep an eye out for is real-time reporting. You should be able to set alerts that notify you if anything goes wrong, so you can fix it as soon as possible.
If your team misses a log deadline, you're alerted. When you need to order a new stock of food or beverages, there should be an alert. You should also get reports on store performance throughout the day.
The automated reporting is customizable, so you don't need to get constant alerts every hour. You can set it to notify you of problem areas you want to stay on top of.
Guided Onboarding
Hiring new staff and training them can get complicated, especially when you're dealing with a larger and busier restaurant. It's easy for them to mess up on the job and disrupt your daily operations. There's also the task of logging their training and making sure you cover every aspect of the job.
The best restaurant software provider covers the entire onboarding process. They create the logs, checklists, and training programs so that your establishment doesn't get affected. This software is available on both Android and iOS, so your new employee doesn't require a computer or webcam.
Compliance Transparency
Part of the reason you take logs is so you can present them to the health inspector. If you write everything down on paper, that means you'll need to rush to find it all when the inspector shows up. It'll also make their job more difficult if your paperwork isn't organized or filled out properly.
Restaurant software is paperless and stores everything online. All you need to do is print out or transfer your documents with the touch of a button. Feel more confident in your restaurant's performance.
Retention
One of the biggest struggles in this day and age is employee retention. Ever since the beginning of Covid-19's impact, restaurants have struggled to bring in employees and keep the ones they already have.
At least part of that struggle is related to how a company treats its employees. Having to work in the middle of an ongoing pandemic proved to be revealing for many restaurant employees.
What you need to do is create a positive work culture that isn't fake or manipulative. It should encourage growth and reward excellence.
Restaurant software allows you to record all the data related to employee performance. That way, any decisions you make will be based on hard facts rather than personal opinions.
Audit Portal
Health inspections are something every restaurant has to go through. However, they aren't the same as business audits. An audit will look at your records and make an assessment of your level of compliance.
A good way to get ahead of them is by performing self-audits. By doing so, you can prepare your restaurant in advance, so you aren't caught off guard by a surprise inspection.
See if your restaurant software has an audit portal where you can do your own. You may also be able to perform mock health inspections on it.
A Variety of Tools
The reason to purchase restaurant software is to improve the overall management of your establishment. Depending on the types of software you invest in, it should come with a variety of tools. These include but are not limited to:
- Temperature logs
- Restaurant checklist
- Inventory software
- Employee and guest health assessments
- Food waste logs
- Cooling logs
- Prep logs
Improve Food Safety and Restaurant Operations
The best restaurant software should be easy to use and improve everything about how you run your restaurant. You can use less paper, have better team accountability, and get alerted whenever a problem pops up. It's all-encompassing and a good investment if you want your restaurant to grow and prosper.
Freshcheq provides restaurant software solutions for food safety compliance. Expect to reduce food waste and improve log completion with our help. Sign up for a demo online or contact us if you have any questions.
