How you can use the "Average Cover" to manage the finer points of your business.
You may already know what your average cover is, but do you use it to help you manage the finer points of your business? A 'cover' is usually defined as any single customer that comes into your establishment. Average cover is calculated as follows: Gross Sales / Total Covers = Average Cover Average cover tells you how much money each customer is spending, on average, when they come to your place. This data can also help you with budgeting, forecasting, and cost control, by doing a few easy calculations. For example, on a Thursday night dinner shift, you sold $4,000 and you had 200 covers.
Your average cover was $20.00. But don't stop there! You can also use the average cover information to help you:
• Forecast scheduling and labor
• Analyze service levels
• Manage upsells
How? Simple. Add a little more data to the mix and use your average cover to assess things like:
• 200 covers / 5 hours = 40 covers per hour
• 200 covers / 5 servers = 40 covers per server
• 200 covers / 40 bottles of wine = 1 bottle per 5 covers
• 200 covers / 35 desserts = 5.7% of covers order dessert
Scheduling and Labor Break down that 200 covers by hour. It might look like this:
5:00 -- 6:00 -- 40 covers 20%
6:00 -- 7:00 -- 50 covers 25%
7:00 -- 8:00 -- 60 covers 30%
8:00 -- 9:00 -- 30 covers 15%
9:00 -- 10:00 -- 20 covers 10%
Knowing how many covers you serve every hour can help you tweak your schedule so that you have enough staff on when it gets busy, and so that you schedule correctly for slower times. You can stagger start times if you know that you have a late dinner rush later in the week, or use salaried staff outside of meal rushes. Analyze service levels If you had five servers working that shift, they each served an average of 40 covers. Does that seem logical? You can use the cover per server calculation to make sure that your customers are getting the right amount of attention from your servers. Do your servers have a bartender making their drinks, do they have a hostess or bus person helping them, or do they have to do it all? These factors affect how many covers a server can serve well. Manage Upsells You sold 40 bottles of wine on that shift, and you sold 35 desserts. By using the covers by upsell calculation, you can determine whether your servers are able to sell to your customers. Are they upselling that bottle of wine, or just taking drink orders as the guests arrive? Do they have to plate their own desserts or does the kitchen do it? Having servers prepare their own desserts can slow dessert sales. These quick calculations, using readily available information, can help you to fine-tune those little things that will help you put more money to your bottom line.
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Opening a Bar
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