Category: Food And Beverage

How to choose food and beverage consultants for your restaurant

Your new restaurant has been well received by your customers. But now that the honeymoon period is over, sales have leveled off. Customers are coming in, but there is no increase in numbers. You find that handling the kitchen is still a nightmare. Food and labor costs are high and you are unable to streamline the business to make it operate in an effective manner. The worst part is that you know that business will pick up with some efficient marketing. But marketing is not your expertise in addition to the fact that you are working almost 70 hour weeks. So, even if you knew exactly how to go about marketing your restaurant, where are the resources? Does it sound like you need to look for food and beverage consultants?You bet.

Most businesspersons do not like the idea of hiring food development consultants for their restaurants. After all, the restaurant is their investment and they do not want to hand over the business to someone else. There is also concern about the expenses involved. When your business is running on thin margins, it is hard to invest in something that does not bring immediate returns. Nevertheless, there are advantages for you in investing in a good food consultant. The first and the most obvious is the measure of objectivity they bring. Most businesspersons find it difficult to be objective about their own business.

Many restaurant operators who are new to the food or hospitality business realize that running a restaurant is a lot more complicated than they thought. When owners begin to realize that they do not know enough about their business, hiring food development consultants becomes inevitable. At this point, owners need help from someone who has done it all before.

Food and beverage consultants can help you in the different areas of your restaurant business, including:

 

Selection of site

 

Development of brand, design and conceptualization

 

Startup

 

Project management

 

Financial planning

 

Recipe development and design

 

Operations

 

Assessment of profits

 

Operating systems

 

Staff training

 

Accounting systems

 

Kitchen management

How do you choose the right people in the food consulting business?

 

First, identify your problems and define the role of the consultant. For instance, climbing food costs may be due to the lack of proper kitchen management, poor systems or even lack of trained staff. It could also be the result of your pricing strategy. If you believe that your pricing is wrong, you need your consultant to have experience evaluating your prices and comparing them with market prices. Some restaurant consultants may not have sufficient experience in kitchen systems and even if they have some, you need to find out whether they have the specific expertise that you need.

 

At times, a restaurant owner is unable to identify their problems, even though they know that the business isn’t running as well as it could. In this case, you need a restaurant/food consultant who has the expertise to undertake an operational assessment.

 

You may opt to take the temporary services of a food consulting firm in order to expand your business or even branch out in a new way.

 

Before you select the restaurant consultant, review their background thoroughly. It’s not enough to find out about the jobs they have done. You also need to know how much time the consultant has actually spent in the industry. You can find this out through a personal interview.

 

Global Food and Beverage Canned Market 2010 to 2015

The packaged food industry has seen a tremendous evolution in terms of the technologies used for packaging. All the recent packaging technologies are devised keeping in mind the convenience of the consumers and the preservation and safety of food items. With rising average annual incomes, better home cooking facilities, and a shift of people towards supermarket or hypermarkets are the major factors driving this market. However, the market for canned foods is expected to slow down as suppliers are switching to other packaging technologies such as cartons, tetra packs, pouches, jars etc. But the market for packaged canned food is expected to rise in the emerging economies such as China, India etc. as the market growth in these countries will be driven by the expansion of new products, particularly tinned cooking sauces and ready meals, and by focusing on the rural markets through efficient distribution channels.

KEY TAKE AWAYS

SCOPE OF THE REPORT

This research report categorizes the global market for F&B can market on the basis of materials, applications, technology, and geography; forecasting revenues and analyzing trends in each of the following submarkets:

On the basis of applications:

On the basis of materials:

On the basis of technology:

On the basis of geography:

STAKEHOLDERS

R&D institutions

Manufacturing journalist Thomas R. Cutler Profiled New Role for QA Managers in the Food and Beverage Journal

Manufacturing journalist Thomas R. Cutler profiled New Role for QA Managers in the Food and Beverage Journal. According to Cutler, “More than half of all Quality Assurance (QA) Managers in food manufacturing do not currently interface with their company’s Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. The Bioterrorism Act, passed in 2002 to ensure the safety of the US food supply from a terrorist attack, is quickly changing the role that food quality professionals play in the selection and utilization of ERP software. ”
ERP selection was often left to a small committee that included the CEO, CFO, Operations and Purchasing Managers. ERP packages were designed to integrate all departments and functions across a company onto a single computer system that can serve all department needs. ERP software, at its best, combines the enterprise into a single, integrated solution that runs off a single database so various departments can easily share information and communicate. When running at an optimum, this integrated approach has a tremendous payback. Until regulations were mandated by the government, QA Managers were rarely considered in the ERP selection process or even utilization of the integrated system.
The Bioterrorism Act makes lot traceability documentation a requirement by law, not merely an option or desirable ERP feature. According to Rebecca Gill, vice President of Technology Group International, a software development house, “Compliance with the Bioterrorism Act means full tracking of raw material lots through manufacturing and of finished good lots through shipment to customer.”
Gill says complete reporting on lot genealogy, showing all usage of lots from vendor to manufacturing to end-user is also a must. The system should also provide the ability to query end-user sales orders and see all raw materials and finished good lots used for specific shipment; evaluate lots from vendors or manufacturing to see all the end-users who received shipments; and track lot properties with allowable “criteria” for each lot.
The complete feature article may be viewed at: http://www.fepsearchgroup.com/fbj/articles/article024.htm.

About Technology Group International, Ltd.
Founded in 1990 and headquartered in Toledo, Ohio, Technology Group International is a proven technology leader delivering Tier 1 application software functionality at a price performance level that can be readily accepted by organizations of all sizes. Specializing in software solutions for small and mid-market manufacturing and distribution companies, TGI’s integrated Enterprise Series software suite is a complete business process management solution. The product offering includes Enterprise Resources Planning (ERP), Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRP), Supply Chain Management (SCM), Warehouse Management System (WMS), Advanced Planning and Scheduling (APS), Decision Support System (DSS), Business Intelligence (BI), Manufacturing Execution System (MES), and eCommerce. TGI implements, maintains, enhances, and supports its packaged distribution and manufacturing software solutions directly and via its channel partners.