Food & Beverage Consulting
How Food & Beverage Consulting Works
Step One: Understand Your Menu Goals
As your Food & Beverage Consultant, I begin with a deep dive into your vision for creating a memorable menu. My approach starts with an in-depth exploration of your restaurant’s concept against the backdrop of local taste profiles and demographic preferences. I will research the competitive landscape to identify opportunities, while also noting trends to leverage—or avoid.
Equally important, I assess the particulars of your operation: dining room capacity, bar setup, kitchen layout, station balance, and available cold and dry storage. By understanding your equipment and workflow, we lay the groundwork for building a menu that is both authentic to your vision and operationally efficient, resonating with guests while setting your team up for success.
Step Two: Menu Framework Design
This is where profitability meets creativity. I will design your menu framework by strategically structuring sections and item categories, with price points and cost of goods sold (COGS) margins in mind. From there, we create a menu blueprint showcasing proposed items, clear descriptions, target pricing, and COGS percentages.
Finally, we refine the menu layout to maximize readability and strategically guide customers toward high-margin items. The result: a thoughtfully designed menu that balances guest appeal with profitability.
Step Three: Operational Menu Development
A well-designed menu only delivers results when paired with the right operational tools. That’s why we create batch and line recipes that are simple to follow and fully costed out. To support your team, I also develop station maps, prep guides, and order guides that streamline execution and improve inventory management.
Together we finalize recipe costing and use menu engineering to fine-tune offerings for profitability—including specialized promotions like happy hour. For staff training, we produce product knowledge sheets so your service team can confidently present and upsell menu items.
To support ongoing financial control, I will provide our Declining Budget tool, designed to guide ordering decisions according to forecasted sales and COGS goals. This ensures your operation runs profitably while maintaining consistency and quality.