Finance & Metrics
Food Cost Percentage
Definition: Cost of food sold divided by food sales, multiplied by 100, for a given period.
Food cost percentage measures how much of every food dollar leaves the restaurant as ingredient and beverage cost. Full-service restaurants often target 28% to 35% depending on protein mix, theft controls, and waste. Fast casual with strong purchasing may run 25% to 30%.
Accurate food cost requires consistent inventory counts, proper receiving, and recipe costing scaled to actual portion sizes. Menu engineering should align star items with sustainable food cost, not only popularity.
Food cost percentage is only half of prime cost; labor must be managed in parallel or margin gains disappear.
Run a free location analysis
Enter any address to get competitor mapping, market gaps, opportunity scoring, and concept ideas.
Analyze your location free Shop equipment at Horeca Store