The biggest factor in your restaurant's success will be how well you control your restaurant's expenses. This includes food, labor, advertising, equipment, management, rent, operating costs and the rest of your overhead costs. Here are some tips for controlling your costs to increase your profits.

Inventory Control

How well you control your inventory may well be the most important aspect deciding your restaurant's future. If you allow costs to spiral out of control and make poor decisions as far as choosing what menu items to serve and their ingredients, your restaurant won't last very long. However, you can maintain stringent control over your inventory and costs with a proper food costing and inventory program. This type of program will allow you to keep track of your inventory, monitor item pricing and specification, verify prices, check invoices against orders, create recipe cards, monitor taste and yield, scale recipes, cost your menu by category, evaluate item popularity and profit margin, calculate actual food and bar costs and compare actual versus projected costs. A good costing software program will allow you to reduce your food costs by 8% or even more.

Leasing

Leasing your restaurant equipment may be a good option for some restaurants. Leasing does not require large down payments and the lease can be extended for long periods of time. Leasing may be advantageous to help control the startup costs of a new restaurant.

Efficiency

The proper management of your restaurant will also be key to your restaurant's success. You will need to make use of a professional point of sale system, as well as an accounting system. Automation in the ordering process can increase efficiency and reduce confusion for employees. The more efficient your restaurant runs, the better chance at success you'll have.

Advertising

Word of mouth is said to be the best advertising you can get, it's also free! Offering great food and great service is the best way to attract great word of mouth advertising and loyal customers, but when getting started, you shouldn't ignore other methods of advertising including the old, reliable yellow pages, large Internet directories, local circulars and newspapers, coupon offers and more local advertising options. Test all paid advertising carefully to make sure you're getting your money's worth, and if it's not bringing in business, drop it.

In summary, control those costs and get efficient and you will be on the road to long term restaurant success.