How much should I sell?

One of the big things that most first time and even some experienced restaurateurs don't know how to do is figure out what their targets really mean. It's quite simple to say, we need to do revenues of Rs. 500,000 but what that really translates to in terms of number of people per month, business growth, costs are things that are usually not thought about.

If you take into account an average inflation of 8% in India, your business needs to grow more than 8% a year in order to be considered a growing and healthy business. Taking conservative growth of 12% or 1% a month. Sales of Rs. 500,000 today should grow to Rs. 525,500 in 6 months and Rs. 557,900 in one year.

How does this translate to the number of people you need to come and eat at your restaurant?
If your restaurant's planned average spend per person is Rs. 150 you need to attract 3,333 people each month or 111 people each day. If the APC is Rs. 400 this changes to 1,250 people / month and 42 people each day. Here's a table that takes you over a few different scenarios.

Hopefully this helps you plan just a little better and not be surprised on how many people you need to have coming through your doors!

Month	Monthly Revenue	150		400		500		550
1	500000	3333	111	1250	42	1000	33	909	30
6	525505	3503	117	1314	44	1051	35	955	32
12	557834	3719	124	1395	46	1116	37	1014	34

Multi-Cusine!!! Really?

A few days back we went to the restaurant because of the promise of good steak. As soon as we reached there the first thing I noticed was the section for steak was hidden in the back on the menu, the first few pages had everything from Vietnamese, Indian, Chinese to Italian food.

After starting a restaurant, I understand why this has happened but just think about it a little. If you're going to put that much pressure on the kitchen to produce all this food, will you really be able to do justice? I know customer ask for all this food but they're also the first people to complain if the Chinese food they're eating in a steak house isn't good. This leads to people thinking that the restaurant isn't good even though you're probably putting out great steaks.

Top Tip: Keep your menu simple, I know people coming to the restaurant will ask for everything from biryani to pasta but if you can resist the urge to serve food that I can assure you will be average; people will start coming there for what you're good at and these are the people you want to serve anyway!