The restaurant industry posted it’s gain in RPI in 3 months in July at 102.7. This was the 29th consecutive month that the index stood above 100. The Current Situation Index saw the largest gain since December 2014 posting a 103.7. This marks the 17th consecutive month above 100 signaling expansion in the market. July …
August 2015
Restaurant Delivery Services
I came across two articles today discussing restaurant delivery services, specifically in Seattle. One on Geek Wire and the other on The Stranger. Both of them were very different in the story they were telling which was interesting. The Stranger talks about how Postmates is reeking havoc on the restaurant industry. Mainly causing “resentment” between …
The challenge with growing operations
There has been a lot of great press this year about the restaurant industry’s economic impact from the number of employees to the estimated $709 billion in revenue in 2015.  Growing your operations is a great accomplishment. You have succeeded and now it’s time to grow and expand.  All you have to do …
Staffing Challenges in North Jersey
An article over the weekend in The Record interviews a few folks in the restaurant industry in norther New Jersey about some of the challenges they are facing around finding and keeping employees. It’s not just isolated to one specific function, but all employees in all departments that are becoming increasingly more difficult to staff. …
Do third party inspection programs drive consistent daily execution?
It’s hard to believe that having a 3rd party inspection service show up twice a year, maybe once per quarter (we very rarely see this), has a big impact on the daily execution of operations.  Anyone can be great for a day or a shift with some notice. But to be great every shift …
Slower Restaurant Employment Growth in San Fran & Seattle
A preliminary look into employment data by Forbes Contributor Stephen Bronars points to slower employment growth since the minimum wage increases in San Francisco and Seattle. In the article Higher Minimum Wages in San Francisco and Seattle Mean Fewer Restaurant Jobs takes a look at year over year quarterly changes in employment averages. Here are …
Scientific Trick to Increase Server Tips
I was watching this YouTube video, a summary of Robert Cialdini’s book Influence.  They talked about experiments that were run in restaurants and how the server’s used the rule of reciprocation to increase tips. The reciprocation principle recognizes that people feel indebted to those who give them a gift.  The social obligation to return a …
Will Minimum Wage Increases Accelerate the Robot Invasion?
There’s an interesting article in the Washington Post, “Minimum-wage offensive could speed arrival of robot-powered restaurants”, suggesting that $15/hr minimum wage will accelerate the move to robots in restaurants. It mentions that shedding labor in the restaurant industry isn’t a new phenomenon. According to the article in the late 60’s a McDonald’s would have 70-80 …
Norm Macdonald Takes Over as the Colonel
I caught an article on entrepreneur.com about KFC bringing in Norm Macdonald to replace Darrell Hammond in their attempt to revive Col Sanders as part of their latest marketing campaign. The author focusing more on the marketing aspect of the change, but he’s a little harsh on some points. Probably trying to get some shock …
Early Job Loss Results From Seattle
We have been actively following the minimum wage hike in Seattle very closely at OpsAnalitica.  We have written four blogs about it this year. We found this article from the American Enterprise Institutes that discusses restaurant job losses in Seattle since the beginning of 2015, it is only 3 paragraphs so I encourage you to read …