a business plan for restaurant

Restaurant Business Plan Template

Written by Dave Lavinsky

Restaurant Business Plan

You’ve come to the right place to create a successful restaurant business plan.

We have helped over 100,000 entrepreneurs and business owners with how to write a restaurant business plan to help them start or grow their restaurants.

What is a Restaurant Business Plan?

A restaurant business plan is a plan to start and/or grow your restaurant business. Among other things, it outlines your business concept, identifies your target market, presents your marketing plan and details your financial projections.  

What are the Main Types of Restaurants?

There are many types of restaurant businesses which vary based on their service style. Restaurants can range in type from fast food, fast casual, moderate casual, fine dining, and bar and restaurant types.

Restaurants also come in a variety of different ethnic or themed categories, such as Mexican restaurants, Asian restaurants, American, etc.  Some restaurants also go mobile and have food trucks.  

How Do You Get Funding for Your Restaurant Business Plan?

Restaurant businesses are most likely to receive funding from banks or independent restaurant investors. Typically you will find a local bank and present your restaurant business plan to them. Most independent restaurant investors are in the restaurant business already and can be a valuable resource for advice and help with your business plan.

Another option for a restaurant business is to obtain a small business loan. SBA loans are a popular option as they offer longer loan terms with lower interest rates.  

Sample Business Plan for a Restaurant Owner

Below is a business plan example to help you create each section of a comprehensive restaurant business plan.

Executive Summary

Business overview.

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse is a new restaurant and steakhouse located in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The menu of Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will include bistro-type dishes that are authentically created and crafted by acclaimed Chef Peter Logan. It will be located in the trendy part of town, known as the Plaza District. The restaurant will be surrounded by classy art galleries, live theater, high-end restaurants and bars, and expensive shopping.

Owned by emerging restaurant operators Chef Peter Logan and Anastasia Gillette, Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse’s mission is to become Oklahoma City’s best, new business for patrons to celebrate their next big event, have a nice date night, or gather with friends or family for a fun evening while dining over finely crafted entrees, desserts, and cocktails.  

Products Served

The following are the menu items to be offered by Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse:

• Soups & Salads
• Gourmet sides
• Wine, Beer & Spirits

A sample menu can be found in the Appendix of this business plan.

Customer Focus

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will target adult men and women between the ages of 21 – 65 with disposable income in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Within this demographic are millennials, young professionals, newlyweds, young families, more established families, and retirees. Because of the pricing structure of the menu, the patrons will likely be upper middle class to the wealthy population of Oklahoma City.  

Management Team

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse is owned and operated by fellow Oklahoma City natives and culinary enthusiasts, Chef Peter Logan and Anastasia Gillette. Both come with a unique skill set and complement each other perfectly. They formerly worked together at another OKC fine dining establishment and made a great team for serving guests delectable food and wine while ensuring the highest level of customer service.

Chef Peter will manage the kitchen operations of Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse, while Anastasia will oversee front of the house operations, maintain and ensure customer service, and manage all reservations.  

Financial Highlights

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse is seeking $300,000 in debt financing to open its start-up restaurant. The funding will be dedicated for the build-out and restaurant design, kitchen, bar and lounge, as well as cooking supplies and equipment, working capital, three months worth of payroll expenses and opening inventory. The breakout of the funding is below:

• Restaurant Build-Out and Design – $100,000
• Kitchen supplies and equipment – $100,000
• Opening inventory – $25,000
• Working capital (to include 3 months of overhead expenses) – $25,000
• Marketing (advertising agency) – $25,000
• Accounting firm (3 months worth and establishment/permitting of business) – $25,000

Company Overview

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse is a new restaurant and steakhouse located in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will serve a wide variety of dishes and beverages and will cater to the upper middle class to wealthier population of Oklahoma City. The menu of Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will include bistro-type dishes that are authentically created and crafted by acclaimed Chef Peter Logan. It will be located in the trendy part of town, known as the Plaza District. The Plaza District is one of Oklahoma’s trendy neighborhoods and is considered the “it” area for newlyweds, millennials, professionals, and young singles. The restaurant will be surrounded by classy art galleries, live theater, high-end restaurants and bars, and expensive shopping.

Owned by emerging restaurant operators Chef Peter Logan and Anastasia Gillette, the restaurant’s mission statement is to become the best new steak restaurant in OKC. The following are the types of menu items Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will serve- shareables, steaks, soups, gourmet sides and salads.

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse History

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse is owned by two Oklahoma City natives, Chef Peter Logan and Anastasia Gillette. They have both worked around the country in fine dining establishments and have a combined twenty years in the restaurant industry. Upon working alongside each other at another fine dining establishment in Oklahoma City, the two of them became good friends and decided to venture into owning their own restaurant.

Chef Peter is the kitchen guru and critically acclaimed chef, while Anastasia manages the front of the house and is a certified Sommelier. Together, with both of their expertise and knowledge, Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse is destined to become Oklahoma City’s next big restaurant.

Industry Analysis

The restaurant industry is expected to grow to over $220 billion in the next five years.

Consumer spending is projected to grow. The Consumer Confidence Index, a leading indicator of spending patterns, is expected to also grow strongly, which will boost industry growth over the next five years. The growth in consumer confidence also suggests that more consumers may opt to segment their disposable income to eating outside the home.

Additionally, an increase in the number of households earning more than $100,000 annually further contributes to the industry growth, supporting industry operators that offer more niche, higher-end products.  This group is expected to continue to grow in size over the next five years.

The urban population represents a large market for the industry. Specifically, time-strapped individuals living in urban areas will likely frequent industry establishments to save time on cooking. The urban population is expected to increase, representing a potential opportunity for the industry.  

Customer Analysis

Demographic profile of target market.

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will target adult men and women between the ages of 21 – 65 with disposable income in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Within this demographic are millennials, young professionals, newlyweds, young families, more established families, and retirees. Because of the pricing structure of the menu, the patrons will likely be upper middle class to the wealthy population of Oklahoma City.

Customer Segmentation

The target audience for Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will primarily include the following customer profile:

• Upper middle class to wealthier population
• Millennials
• Young professionals
• Households with an average income of at least $75k
• Foodies and culture enthusiasts

Competitive Analysis

Direct and indirect competitors.

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will be competing with other restaurants in Oklahoma City. A profile of each of our direct competitors is below.

Located in the trendy area known as the Plaza District, The Press has reimagined our favorite foods of the surrounding regions through the lens of home.

The menu consists of appetizers, soups, burgers and sandwiches, bowls, main dishes, sides, desserts, and a large selection of alcoholic beverages. The Press serves craft beer, domestic beer, wine spritzers, house cocktails, wine, and mimosas. They also offer brunch. The menu of The Press is affordable with the most expensive dish being $16. The wine menu is also not pretentious as the wine is sold either by the glass or bottle, with the most expensive bottle being $52 for the Gruet Sparkling Brut Rose.  

Oak & Ore

Oak & Ore is a craft beer and restaurant in OKC’s Plaza District. They have a 36-tap beer selection and offer vegetarian, vegan, and gluten free dining options. Oak & Ore offers a rotating, 36-tap selection of their favorite brews from Oklahoma and around the world. Each beer is thoughtfully paired with a craft beer-inspired restaurant experience.

The food menu of Oak & Ore offers starters, salads, wings, fried chicken, sandwiches, tacos, banh mi, and sides. They also have a selection of kids dishes so the whole family can enjoy comfort food while sampling one of their delectable beers.

The Mule OKC

The Mule is a casual, hip restaurant offering a large beer and cocktail menu plus sandwiches and more. Located in the constantly growing and buzzing hub that is the Plaza District, The Mule takes the timeless favorite and contorts it into a whole menu of wild offerings.

There is also a fantastic assortment of soups offered and The Mule shakes up a seasonal list of cocktails designed by their bar staff. During the winter months, patrons can stave off the cold with their versions of hot toddies and buttered rum. For the beer drinkers, they always have a reliable line-up of fresh cold brews on draft, as well as a wide selection of can.  

Competitive Advantage

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse offers several advantages over its competition. Those advantages are:

• Gourmet dishes elegantly prepared to the finest standard.
• Selection of steaks sourced from local Oklahoma farms.
• An exclusive and unique wine menu that includes a wine selection of all price points.
• Highly sought after location: Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will be located in the trendy and attractive neighborhood known as The Plaza District.
• Trendy, welcoming, and energetic ambiance that will be perfect for a night out or a celebration.

Marketing Plan

Promotions strategy.

The marketing strategy for Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse is as follows:

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse’s location is a promotions strategy in itself. The Plaza District is a destination spot for locals, tourists, and anyone looking for the trendiest food fare in Oklahoma City. The Plaza District is home to OKC’s most popular bars and restaurants, art galleries, theaters, and boutique shopping. The millennials, young professionals, and foodies will frequent Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse for the location itself.

Social Media

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will use social media to cater to the millennials and Oklahoma City residents. Chef Peter and Anastasia plan to hire an advertising agency to take professional photographs of the menu items and location to create appealing posts to reach a greater audience. The posts will include pictures of the menu items, as well as upcoming featured options.  

SEO Website Marketing

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse plans to invest funds into maintaining a strong SEO presence on search engines like Google and Bing. When a person types in “local fine dining restaurant” or “Oklahoma City restaurant”, Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will appear in the top three choices. The website will include the full menu, location, hours, and lots of pictures of the food, drinks, and steaks.  

Third Party Delivery Sites

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will maintain a presence on sites like GrubHub, Uber Eats, Doordash, and Postmates so that people looking for local food to be delivered will see Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse listed near the top.  

Operations Plan

Operation functions:.

The company will hire the following:

• 4 sous chefs
• 2 bartenders
• 2 hostesses
• The company will hire an advertising agency and an accounting firm

Milestones:

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse aims to open in the next 6 months. The following are the milestones needed in order to obtain this goal.

7/1/202X – Execute lease for prime location in the Plaza District.

7/2/202X – Begin construction of restaurant build-out.

7/10/202X – Finalize menu.

7/17/202X – Hire advertising company to begin developing marketing efforts.

8/15/202X – Start of marketing campaign

8/22/202X – Final walk-thru of completed restaurant build-out.

8/25/202X – Hire the entire team of sous chefs, servers, and bussers.

9/1/202X – Decoration and set up of restaurant.

9/15/202X – Grand Opening of Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will be owned and operated by Chef Peter Logan and Anastasia Gillette. Each will have a 50% ownership stake in the restaurant.

Chef Peter Logan, Co-Owner

Chef Peter Logan is an Oklahoma City native and has been in the restaurant industry for over ten years. He was trained in a prestigious Le Cordon Bleu Culinary Academy in San Francisco and has worked in some of the nation’s most prestigious fine dining restaurants. His tenure has took him from the west coast to the east coast, and now he’s back doing what he loves in his hometown of Oklahoma City.

Chef Peter will manage the kitchen operations of Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse. He will train and oversee the sous chefs, manage inventory, place food inventory orders, deal with the local food vendors, and ensure the highest customer satisfaction with the food.

Anastasia Gillette, Co-Owner

Anastasia Gillette was born and raised in Oklahoma City and has garnered over ten years in the industry as well. While in college, Anastasia worked as a hostess at one of the area’s most prestigious restaurant establishments. While there, she was eventually promoted to Front of the House Manager where she oversaw the hostesses, servers, bussers, bartenders, and reservations. Her passion always led to the beverage portion of the restaurant so she obtained her Sommelier certificate in 2019. With her wine education, Anastasia is able to cultivate an interesting and elegant wine selection for the restaurant.

Anastasia will oversee front of the house operations, maintain and ensure customer service, and manage all reservations. She will also be in charge of the bar and wine ordering, training of front of the house staff, and will manage the restaurant’s social media accounts once they are set up.  

Financial Plan

Key revenue & costs.

The revenue drivers for Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse will come from the food and drink menu items being offered daily.

The cost drivers will be the ingredients and products needed to make the menu items as well as the cooking materials. A significant cost driver is the fine dining equipment, serving dishes, and beer and wine glasses. Other cost drivers will be the overhead expenses of payroll for the employees, accounting firm, and cost of the advertising agency.

Funding Requirements and Use of Funds

Bluehorn Restaurant & Steakhouse is seeking $300,000 in debt financing to open its start-up restaurant. The breakout of the funding is below:

Financial Projections

Income statement.

Balance Sheet

Cash Flow Statement

  You can download our free restaurant business plan template PDF . This restaurant business plan template can be used to create a finalized business plan for your restaurant concept.

Eat App for

How it works

How to Write a Restaurant Business Plan in 2024 (Free Template)

So you want to open a restaurant? Then you need a business plan.

A restaurant business plan is your roadmap to success. It outlines and forecasts every aspect of your restaurant’s operation and management —from menu design and location to financial planning and staff training. A comprehensive restaurant business plan demonstrates professionalism and a clear understanding of goals, increasing your chances of achieving long-term success in the competitive restaurant industry.

Why is a strong business plan important? Because it turns your restaurant idea into reality. According to the National Restaurant Association , having a business plan increases your chances of success by preparing you for problems before they arise and attracting investors and partners.

Planning is the key to restaurant success. Without a plan, you risk being part of the 30% of restaurants that fail in the first year​. To make sure your restaurant succeeds, you can start by creating a business plan. Financial projections are a crucial component, helping to secure funding and plan for the future. Here’s how to get started.

The importance of a restaurant business plan 

Think of your business plan as your ultimate guide, showing business owners, stakeholders, and investors how you’re going to turn your vision into reality. It ensures nothing is overlooked as you grow your restaurant . When you’re deep in the chaos of construction, licensing, staffing, and other challenges, your business plan will keep you on track and focused. Without one, navigating the complex world of opening a restaurant becomes much tougher.

A solid business plan is also key to attracting investors. Most new restaurants need some outside capital from hospitality investors or silent partners. Before they invest in your dream, they need to see that you’ve got a solid, thought-out plan for success. Your business plan shows investors that you’ve considered every expense and every possible scenario. It provides a complete description of your strategy, highlights the experience and skills of your management team, and explains why and how it will succeed.

Every business should have a business plan, whether new or existing. Business plans help you focus on your goals and can help get back on track if you stray from them.

• How to write a restaurant business plan

Whether this is your first business plan or your 10th, using a template specifically designed for the restaurant industry can be incredibly helpful. Our restaurant business plan template includes all the necessary sections you need. You can download a customizable copy of the business plan template here.

Conducting a thorough market analysis to understand customer demographics and competition is crucial for the success of your restaurant. Keep reading to learn about the key elements that make a restaurant business plan successful.

Further reading

• How to Write a Restaurant Business Plan Executive Summary
• Your Complete Guide to Restaurant Financing and Loans
• How To Conduct a Restaurant Market Analysis
• Essential elements of a restaurant business plan

Design a branded cover page

Start with a branded cover page that showcases your logo, brand fonts, and all relevant contact information. This sets a professional tone and makes your business plan easily identifiable.

Write the executive summary

Begin your restaurant business plan with an executive summary . This section introduces and sums up your entire vision, making sure to grab the reader’s attention. It should make investors feel invested in your idea and eager to read more.

Key elements to include are your restaurant’s mission statement , proposed concept, how you’ll execute the plan, an overview of potential costs, anticipated return on investment, as well as a business succession plan. Describe your restaurant concept, detailing the type of food being served, service style, design elements, and unique features. This is also a great spot to highlight your business’s core values. A strong executive summary sets the tone for your business plan and helps attract investor interest.

Additionally, include a management team write-up to highlight the credentials and past experiences of your management team, demonstrating their ability to run a successful establishment.

A well-conceived mission statement can provide a guiding light to keep your restaurant moving in the right direction. It helps ensure that every decision you make and every interaction you have is in line with your core values and goals.

Create the company overview

In this section, you’ll lay out the foundational details of your restaurant. Start by introducing the basic information: the restaurant’s name, address, and contact details. Include information about the owner and their background, showcasing their experience and passion for the industry. This sets the stage for your business’s credibility.

Next, describe the restaurant’s legal standing and its short- and long-term objectives. This helps potential investors understand the structure and vision of your business.

Highlight your understanding of the local food industry with a brief market research summary. Explain why your restaurant will succeed in this market by demonstrating awareness of local dining trends and consumer preferences. Crafting your own restaurant business plan is crucial to showcase your dedication and strategic planning, learning from others' mistakes to ensure success.

Here’s a sample layout for this section:

Company description

Restaurant Name : [Restaurant Name]

Location: [Restaurant Address]

Contact: [Restaurant Phone Number] | [Restaurant Email Address]

Owner: [Owner Name]

Experience: [Owner Name] has over [Number] years of experience in the restaurant industry. They have worked in various roles, including [List of Roles]. They are passionate about food and creating a memorable dining experience for their guests.

Legal Standing: [Restaurant Name] is a [Type of Legal Entity] registered in [State/Province].

• How to Write a Great Restaurant Description

Include an industry analysis

First describe the current state of the market sector your restaurant will be in and the specific area you will be in. This should include local economic growth, existing restaurants, infrastructure projects, nearby businesses, residential areas and foot and car traffic counts.

To create an effective and professional business plan, it is important to study restaurant business plan samples.

1. Review your target market

The restaurant industry is competitive so you need to find your niche. What will make your restaurant different? Who will your restaurant attract and who will be your repeat customers? Describe your target market and compare it to the overall restaurant industry in terms of diner demographics, characteristics and behaviour.

2. Location analysis

Even if you don’t have a specific location yet, focus on the general area or city where you will be opening your restaurant and explain why. Include local economic growth, major events and nearby infrastructure projects. Compare the current market conditions to your target market to show the proposed location fits your ideal customer profile. Investors will be looking closely at this section to make sure the location is right for your concept.

3. Competitive analysis

Get into the competitive landscape around your proposed location. Detail the number of other restaurants in the area, especially those with similar concepts. Investors want to know what will make customers choose your restaurant over the competition. What will make your food and service stand out and what other advantages do you have, like longer hours? Use a competitive matrix to show you understand your niche in the market.

Put together a restaurant marketing plan 

The marketing section outlines how you’ll promote your restaurant before and after opening. Not sure where to start? Check out our guide here. A well-thought-out marketing plan is crucial to grow a successful restaurant and distinguish it from competitors.

Start by listing out specific tactics you’ll use pre and post-launch. Will you work with a PR manager? Launch a social media account to document the build-out and generate buzz. Share those details. If you already have a large social media following , make sure to mention it.

Once the restaurant is open , which channels will you use to keep the momentum going? Email marketing? Regular social media posts? Charity partnerships? Local TV and radio ads? Will you invest in customer relationship management software to keep in touch with regulars or implement a loyalty program?

This section should give a clear picture of your promotional strategy and how you plan to engage with potential customers from the start.

Outline your operation plan

Here’s how to outline your restaurant’s day-to-day operations once the doors open. Cover these key areas:

Clearly defining the service style of your restaurant, whether it is fine dining , quick-service, self-service, or another type, is important to ensure a consistent customer experience.

1. Staffing

Think about the positions you'll need and how many people you'll need for each role. What will make your place a fantastic workplace? Outline the pay for each position, how you'll recruit the right people, and what the hiring criteria will be.

2. Customer service policies and procedures

How will you ensure an exceptional and consistent guest experience every time? Detail your service values, policies, and procedures, and explain how you'll enforce or encourage them.

3. Restaurant point of sale and other systems

How will you keep track of sales and inventory, manage takeout and delivery, control labor, handle cash, process payroll, and accept various payment types? Cover the systems you'll use for all these tasks.

4. Suppliers

Where will you get your ingredients? Think about both one-time equipment purchases and items that need regular replenishment. Detail your plans for sourcing these essentials.

Nail down your financial game plan with first-year projections

The financial analysis usually wraps up your business plan, and it’s where investors really focus in. They want to see exactly how you’ll spend their money in the first year and how you expect costs and revenue to stack up. Make sure to hit these key points in this section.

1. Your investment plan

Here’s where you put in the initial investment and how you’ll use it in the first year. Think kitchen equipment, furniture, decor, payroll, legal fees, marketing, and a bit of working capital.

2. The projected profit and loss (P&L) statement

Since the business plan is done way before you open your restaurant you’ll need to make some educated guesses for your P&L statement. Estimate costs and sales based on your restaurant’s size, target market and the local competition. Use this P&L template and guide to dive deeper into P&L statements and create one for your future restaurant.

3. The break-even strategy

This is where you show investors how much monthly revenue you’ll need to cover all your overhead and operational costs. Remember there are always variable costs so highlight what you think those will be. How will you hit that revenue target during slow months?

4. Cash flow prediction

Your cash flow expectations hinge on your inventory purchases, staff size, payroll, and payment schedule. Some months will be better than others once your restaurant is up and running. This cash flow analysis will show investors that, based on your forecasts, your restaurant can sustain itself during leaner months without needing extra investments.

How to sell a restaurant idea and master your business plan presentation

Once your business plan is polished and ready, it's time to become its number one expert. Investors want to see that you know every nook and cranny of your business and are confident you can make it happen.

When you're ready, email your business plan to anyone in your network who might be interested in investing. With any luck, you'll get some interest, and investors will want to meet to discuss your restaurant.

Some investors might want a pitch presentation alongside the printed business plan. Use a professional template from Google Sheets or PowerPoint, and practice until you can nail the presentation without notes.

Be prepared for any questions—both the expected ones and those that come out of left field. If you don’t know an answer on the spot, it’s fine to say you’ll find out and get back to them quickly.

A well-crafted restaurant business plan serves as a roadmap to success, guiding every aspect of the venture from menu design to employee training.

By carefully considering each component of the plan, aspiring restaurateurs can increase their chances of securing funding, attracting customers, and achieving their long-term goals. Including a sample menu in the business plan is necessary to showcase planned dishes and prices, which helps in selling the restaurant concept to potential investors and customers.

Remember, a restaurant business plan is not just a document to satisfy investors; it is a living tool that should be revisited and updated regularly as the business grows and evolves.

By staying committed to the plan and adapting it as needed, restaurateurs can ensure that their culinary dreams have a solid foundation for success.

hbspt.cta._relativeUrls=true;hbspt.cta.load(3390327, 'b21455f2-657f-4d13-9912-9dc6f211e990', {"useNewLoader":"true","region":"na1"}); FAQs

How much profit does the restaurant make.

When it comes to restaurant profitability, the numbers can widely vary. On average, restaurants report profit margins between 3% and 5% annually.

Fast-food establishments often have lower margins but benefit from a high volume of customers and quick turnover rates. In contrast, fine dining venues, although charging higher prices, see fewer customers and slower turnover, which influences their profit margins differently.

Our research indicates that, regardless of the type of restaurant, the average monthly profit usually falls between $15,000 and $25,000.

How to open a restaurant without money?

Starting a restaurant can be a daunting task, especially when funds are tight. However, with some creativity and determination, you can turn your dream into a reality. Here’s how:

Innovate Your Restaurant Concept

Consider a unique, low-cost restaurant concept. Instead of a full-scale establishment, perhaps a pop-up restaurant or a delivery-only kitchen could better fit your budget. Flexibility in your concept can significantly reduce initial costs.

Seek Funding Alternatives

Traditional bank loans aren't the only option. Look for investors who believe in your vision or explore crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter or GoFundMe . Sometimes, you can even find grants aimed at smal l business startups.

Leverage Online Platforms

Start by building a strong online presence. Create a website and utilize social media to attract and engage customers. Online marketing can be a cost-effective way to generate buzz and gather a customer base before you even open your doors.

Collaborate with Other Businesses

Partnerships can pave the way for mutual growth. Collaborate with food suppliers, local farms, or even other small businesses to share costs and resources. This strategy can also expand your network and increase visibility within your community.

Start Small: Food Trucks or Catering

Consider launching your concept through a food truck, catering service, or pop-up stand. These options require significantly less capital than a traditional sit-down restaurant and can help you build your brand and customer base.

Growth Marketing Manager at Eat App

Saif Alnasur used to work in his family restaurant, but now he is a food influencer and writes about the restaurant industry for Eat App.

Reviewed by

Nezar Kadhem

Co-founder and CEO of Eat App

He is a regular speaker and panelist at industry events, contributing on topics such as digital transformation in the hospitality industry, revenue channel optimization and dine-in experience.

Share this article!

Related articles

SWOT Analysis for:...

Your restaurant may have the best ambiance or...

How to Calculate Food Cost in:...

Whether you're putting together a menu for your...

How to Write a Restaurant:...

An executive summary for a restaurant is a...

Join restaurants in 70+ countries using Eat App

Empowering restaurants, one table at a time Discover seamless dining with Eat App

• Reservation system
• Table management
• CRM and guest profiles
• Reports & trends
• WhatsApp messaging
• Integrations
• Privacy policy
• Terms of service
• The 16 Best Reservation Systems
• Guide to Restaurant Marketing
• Guide to Customer Service
• Guide to Making a Restaurant Website
• All articles

"> "> Compare us

• Compare All

© Eat App. All rights reserved.

• Credit cards
• View all credit cards
• Banking guide
• Loans guide
• Insurance guide
• Personal finance
• View all personal finance
• Small business
• Small business guide
• View all taxes

You’re our first priority. Every time.

We believe everyone should be able to make financial decisions with confidence. And while our site doesn’t feature every company or financial product available on the market, we’re proud that the guidance we offer, the information we provide and the tools we create are objective, independent, straightforward — and free.

So how do we make money? Our partners compensate us. This may influence which products we review and write about (and where those products appear on the site), but it in no way affects our recommendations or advice, which are grounded in thousands of hours of research. Our partners cannot pay us to guarantee favorable reviews of their products or services. Here is a list of our partners .

How to Write a Restaurant Business Plan

Many, or all, of the products featured on this page are from our advertising partners who compensate us when you take certain actions on our website or click to take an action on their website. However, this does not influence our evaluations. Our opinions are our own. Here is a list of our partners and here's how we make money .

When starting a business—no matter what type of business that may be—a business plan is essential to map out your intentions and direction. That’s the same for a restaurant business plan, which will help you figure out where you fit in the landscape, how you’re going to differ from other establishments around you, how you’ll market your business, and even what you’re going to serve. A business plan for your restaurant can also help you later if you choose to apply for a business loan .

While opening a restaurant isn’t as risky as you’ve likely heard, you still want to ensure that you’re putting thought and research into your business venture to set it up for success. And that’s where a restaurant business plan comes in.

We’ll go through how to create a business plan for a restaurant and a few reasons why it’s so important. After you review the categories and the restaurant business plan examples, you can use the categories to make a restaurant business plan template and start your journey.

Why you shouldn’t skip a restaurant business plan

First-time restaurateurs and industry veterans alike all need to create a business plan when opening a new restaurant . That’s because, even if you deeply understand your business and its nuances (say, seasonal menu planning or how to order correct quantities), a restaurant is more than its operations. There’s marketing, financing, the competitive landscape, and more—and each of these things is unique to each door you open.

That’s why it’s so crucial to understand how to create a business plan for a restaurant. All of these things and more will be addressed in the document—which should run about 20 or 30 pages—so you’ll not only have a go-to-market strategy, but you’ll also likely figure out some things about your business that you haven’t even thought of yet.

Additionally, if you’re planning to apply for business funding down the line, some loans—including the highly desirable SBA loan —actually require you to submit your business plan to gain approval. In other words: Don’t skip this step!

How much do you need?

with Fundera by NerdWallet

We’ll start with a brief questionnaire to better understand the unique needs of your business.

Once we uncover your personalized matches, our team will consult you on the process moving forward.

How to write a restaurant business plan: Step by step

There’s no absolute format for a restaurant business plan that you can’t stray from—some of these sections might be more important than others, for example, or you might find that there’s a logical order that makes more sense than the one in the restaurant business plan example below. However, this business plan outline will serve as a good foundation, and you can use it as a restaurant business plan template for when you write your own.

Executive summary

Your executive summary is one to two pages that kick off your business plan and explain your vision. Even though this might seem like an introduction that no one will read, that isn’t the case. In fact, some investors only ask for the executive summary. So, you’ll want to spend a lot of time perfecting it.

Your restaurant business plan executive summary should include information on:

Mission statement: Your goals and objectives

General company information: Include your founding date, team roles (i.e. executive chef, sous chefs, sommeliers), and locations

Category and offerings: What category your restaurant fits into, what you’re planning to serve (i.e. farm-to-table or Korean), and why

Context for success: Any past success you’ve had, or any current financial data that’ll support that you are on the path to success

Financial requests: If you’re searching for investment or financing, include your plans and goals here and any financing you’ve raised or borrowed thus far

Future plans: Your vision for where you’re going in the next year, three years, and five years

When you’re done with your executive summary, you should feel like you’ve provided a bird’s eye view of your entire business plan. In fact, even though this section is first, you will likely write it last so you can take the highlights from each of the subsequent sections.

And once you’re done, read it on its own: Does it give a comprehensive, high-level overview of your restaurant, its current state, and your vision for the future? Remember, this may be the only part of your business plan potential investors or partners will read, so it should be able to stand on its own and be interesting enough to make them want to read the rest of your plan.

Company overview

This is where you’ll dive into the specifics of your company, detailing the kind of restaurant you’re looking to create, who’s helping you do it, and how you’re prepared to accomplish it.

Your restaurant business plan company overview should include:

Purpose: The type of restaurant you’re opening (fine dining, fast-casual, pop-up, etc.), type of food you’re serving, goals you have, and the niche you hope to fill in the market

Area: Information on the area in which you’re opening

Customers: Whom you’re hoping to target, their demographic information

Legal structure: Your business entity (i.e. LLC, LLP, etc.) and how many owners you have

Similar to your executive summary, you won’t be going into major detail here as the sections below will get into the nitty-gritty. You’ll want to look at this as an extended tear sheet that gives someone a good grip on your restaurant or concept, where it fits into the market, and why you’re starting it.

Team and management

Barely anything is as important for a restaurant as the team that runs it. You’ll want to create a section dedicated to the members of your staff—even the ones that aren’t yet hired. This will provide a sense of who is taking care of what, and how you need to structure and build out the team to get your restaurant operating at full steam.

Your restaurant business plan team and management section should have:

Management overview: Who is running the restaurant, what their experience and qualifications are, and what duties they’ll be responsible for

Staff: Other employees you’ve brought on and their bios, as well as other spots you anticipate needing to hire for

Ownership percentage: Which individuals own what percentage of the restaurant, or if you are an employee-owned establishment

Be sure to update this section with more information as your business changes and you continue to share this business plan—especially because who is on your team will change both your business and the way people look at it.

Sample menu

You’ll also want to include a sample menu in your restaurant business plan so readers have a sense of what they can expect from your operations, as well as what your diners can expect from you when they sit down. This will also force you to consider exactly what you want to serve your diners and how your menu will stand out from similar restaurants in the area. Although a sample menu is in some ways self-explanatory, consider the following:

Service : If your brunch is as important as your dinner, provide both menus; you also might want to consider including both a-la-carte and prix fixe menus if you plan to offer them.

Beverage/wine service: If you’ll have an emphasis on specialty beverages or wine, a separate drinks list could be important.

Seasonality: If you’re a highly seasonal restaurant, you might want to consider providing menus for multiple seasons to demonstrate how your dishes (and subsequent purchasing) will change.

Market analysis

This is where you’ll begin to dive deeper. Although you’ve likely mentioned your market and the whitespace you hope to address, the market analysis section will enable you to prove your hypotheses.

Your restaurant business plan market analysis should include:

Industry information: Include a description of the restaurant industry, its size, growth trends, and other trends regarding things such as tastes, trends, demographics, structures, etc.

Target market: Zoom in on the area and neighborhood in which you’re opening your restaurant as well as the type of cuisine you’re serving.

Target market characteristics: Describe your customers and their needs, how/if their needs are currently being served, other important pieces about your specific location and customers.

Target market size and growth: Include a data-driven section on the size of your market, trends in its growth, how your target market fits into the industry as a whole, projected growth of your market, etc.

Market share potential: Share how much potential there is in the market, how much your presence will change the market, and how much your specific restaurant or restaurant locations can own of the open market; also touch on any barriers to growth or entry you might see.

Market pricing: Explain how you’ll be pricing your menu and where you’ll fall relative to your competitors or other restaurants in the market.

Competitive research: Include research on your closest competitors, how they are both succeeding and failing, how customers view them, etc.

If this section seems like it might be long, it should—it’s going to outline one of the most important parts of your strategy, and should feel comprehensive. Lack of demand is the number one reason why new businesses fail, so the goal of this section should be to prove that there is demand for your restaurant and show how you’ll capitalize on it.

Additionally, if market research isn’t your forte, don’t be shy to reach out to market research experts to help you compile the data, or at least read deeply on how to conduct effective research.

Marketing and sales

Your marketing and sales section should feel like a logical extension of your market analysis section, since all of the decisions you’ll make in this section should follow the data of the prior section.

The marketing and sales sections of your restaurant business plan should include:

Positioning: How you’ll describe your restaurant to potential customers, the brand identity and visuals you’ll use to do it, and how you’ll stand out in the market based on the brand you’re building

Promotion: The tools, tactics, and platforms you’ll use to market your business

Sales: How you’ll convert on certain items, and who/how you will facilitate any additional revenue streams (i.e. catering)

It’s likely that you’ll only have concepts for some of these elements, especially if you’re not yet open. Still, get to paper all of the ideas you have, and you can (and should) always update them later as your restaurant business becomes more fully formed.

Business operations

The business operations section should get to the heart of how you plan to run your business. It will highlight both internal factors as well as external forces that will dictate how you run the ship.

The business operations section should include:

Management team: Your management structure and hierarchy, and who is responsible for what

Hours: Your hours and days of operation

Location: What’s special about your location that will get people through the door

Relationships: Any advantageous relationships you have with fellow restaurateurs, places for sourcing and buying, business organizations, or consultants on your team

Add here anything you think could be helpful for illustrating how you’re going to do business and what will affect it.

Here, you’ll detail the current state of your business finances and project where you hope to be in a year, three years, and five years. You’ll want to detail what you’ve spent, what you will spend, where you’ll get the money, costs you might incur, and returns you’ll hope to see—including when you can expect to break even and turn a profit.

Financial statements: If you’ve been in business for any amount of time, include existing financial statements (i.e. profit and loss, balance sheet, cash flow, etc.)

Budget: Your current budget or a general startup budget

Projections: Include revenue, cash flow, projected profit and loss, and other costs

Debt: Include liabilities if the business has any outstanding debt or loans

Funding request: If you’re requesting a loan or an investment, lay out how much capital you’re looking for, your company’s valuation (if applicable), and the purpose of the funding

Above all, as you’re putting your financials together, be realistic—even conservative. You want to give any potential investors a realistic picture of your business.

Feel like there are other important components but they don't quite fit in any of the other categories (or make them run too long)? That’s what the restaurant business plan appendix section is for. And although in, say, a book, an appendix can feel like an afterthought, don’t ignore it—this is another opportunity for you to include crucial information that can give anyone reading your plan some context. You may include additional data, graphs, marketing collateral (like logo mockups), and more.

LLC Formation

The bottom line

Whether you’re writing a restaurant business plan for investors, lenders, or simply for yourself and your team, the most important thing to do is make sure your document is comprehensive. A good business plan for a restaurant will take time—and maybe a little sweat—to complete fully and correctly.

One other crucial thing to remember: a business plan is not a document set in stone. You should often look to it to make sure you’re keeping your vision and mission on track, but you should also feel prepared to update its components as you learn more about your business and individual restaurant.

This article originally appeared on JustBusiness, a subsidiary of NerdWallet.

On a similar note...

• Canada (EN)
• Canada (FR)
• Deutschland
• Netherlands
• United Arab Emirates
• United Kingdom
• United States
• Take reservations
• Market your restaurant
• Run smoother shifts
• Sell events & experiences
• Manage reviews
• Manage guest profiles
• View all restaurant solutions
• Robust reporting and insights
• The largest diner network
• 24/7 customer support
• For restaurants
• For restaurant groups & enterprise
• For bars & wineries
• For hotels & casinos
• Integrations
• Pricing and plans
• View all industry insights
• Industry expertise Get advice and tactics from top industry authorities.
• Hospitality Find out how the most successful restaurants make every guest feel like a VIP.
• Marketing Learn how to bring new guests to the table with the latest tech, tools, and ideas for every marketing budget.
• Operations How to iron out operations for shifts smooth as butter.
• Industry trends
• Product innovation
• Advisory board
• Case studies
• Get started

How to write a restaurant business plan

A small restaurant business plan is the roadmap you use to open a successful spot. As a first step to creating yours, ask your friends and colleagues to share restaurant business plan examples. Their restaurant business plan samples can inspire yours.

Once you’ve studied those examples, it’s time to start writing your own. No matter how much thought you’ve put into your concept or how many trusted colleagues have assured you of its greatness, you must write a restaurant business plan. It will prove the viability of your concept to potential investors and provide them with a clear and engaging answer to the question: “Why does the world need this restaurant?”

“The point of a business plan is to show that you’ve done your homework,” says Charles Bililies, owner of Souvla , a fine casual Greek restaurant in San Francisco that has received national acclaim since opening in the spring of 2014.

“You have to show any potential investor that you have an actual plan, you know what you’re talking about, it looks professional, and you’re not just screwing around.”

Quick links Branded cover Table of contents Concept Sample menu Service Management team Design Target market Location Market overview Marketing and publicity Specialists and consultants Business structure Financials

1. Branded cover

Include your logo (even if it’s not finalized), the date, and your name.

2. Table of contents

A table of contents in a restaurant business plan provides an organized overview of the document’s structure and content. It typically appears at the beginning of the plan and lists the major sections and subsections with their corresponding page numbers.

The table of contents is important for several reasons. Firstly, it allows readers to quickly navigate through the plan, enabling easy access to specific sections of interest. Secondly, it helps in presenting a professional and well-structured document, showing that you have carefully organized your thoughts and ideas. It also improves readability and comprehension, as readers can easily locate and refer back to relevant information

3. Restaurant concept

Describe your restaurant concept and get the reader excited about your idea. Specify whether the restaurant will be fine dining or more casual. Include an executive summary and go into detail about the food you’ll be serving, inspiration behind your concept, and an overview of service style.

Define clearly what will be unique about your restaurant and include your mission statement. This section should include a market analysis that shows how your restaurant will be similar and different from competing restaurants.

4. Sample menu

The menu is the most important touchpoint of any restaurant’s brand, so this should be more than just a simple list of items. Incorporate your logo and mock up a formatted menu design (tap a designer for help if needed).

Your sample menu should also include prices that are based on a detailed cost analysis. This will:

• Give investors a clear understanding of your targeted price point
• Provide the info needed to estimate check averages
• Show the numbers used create financial projections for starting costs
• Show investors that you’ve done the homework
• Prove you can stay within a budget

This section is most relevant for:

• Fine-dining concepts
• Concepts that have a unique service style
• Owners who have particularly strong feelings about what role service will play in their restaurant.

It can be a powerful way of conveying your approach to hospitality to investors by explaining the details of the guest’s service experience.

Will your restaurant have counter service and restaurant hostess software designed to get guests on their way as quickly as possible, or will it look more like a theater, with captains putting plates in front of guests simultaneously?

If an extensive wine program is an integral part of what you’re doing, will you have a sommelier? If you don’t feel that service is a noteworthy component of your operation, address it briefly in the concept section.

6. Management team

Write a brief overview of yourself and the team you have established so far. You want to show that your experience has provided you with the necessary skills to run a successful restaurant and act as a restaurant business owner.

Ideally, once you have described the strong suit of every member of your team, you’ll be presenting a full pitch deck. Most independent restaurant investors are in this for more than just money, so giving some indication of what you value and who you are outside of work may also be helpful.

Incorporate some visuals. Create a mood board that shows images related to the design and feeling of your restaurant.

Whether you’re planning to cook in a wood-burning oven or are designing an eclectic front-of-house, be sure to include those ideas. Photos of materials and snippets of other restaurants that you love that are similar to the brand you’re building are also helpful.

8. Target market

Who is going to eat at your restaurant? What do they do for a living, how old are they, and what’s their average income? Once you’ve described them in detail, reiterate why your specific concept will appeal to them.

9. Location

There should be a natural and very clear connection between the information you present in the “Target Market” section and this one. You probably won’t have a specific site identified at this point in the process, but you should talk about viable neighborhoods.

Don’t assume that potential investors will be familiar with the areas you’re discussing and who works or lives there—make the connections clear. You want readers to be confident that your restaurant’s “ideal” diner intersects with the neighborhood(s) you’re proposing as often as possible.

If you don’t have a site , this is a good place to discuss what you’re looking for in terms of square footage, foot traffic, parking, freeway accessibility, outdoor seating , and other important details.

10. Market overview

Address the micro and macro market conditions in your area and how they relate to licenses and permits. At a macro level, what are the local and regional economic conditions?

If restaurants are doing poorly, explain why yours won’t; if restaurants are doing well, explain how you’ll be able to compete in an already booming restaurant climate. At a micro level, discuss who your direct competitors are. Talk about what types of restaurants share your target market and how you’ll differentiate yourself.

11. Marketing and publicity

The restaurant landscape is only getting more competitive. Discuss your pre- and post-opening marketing plans to show investors how you plan to gain traction leading up to opening day, as well as how you’ll keep the momentum going.

If you’re going to retain a PR/marketing company, introduce them and explain why you’ve chosen them over other companies (including some of their best-known clients helps). If not, convey that you have a solid plan in place to generate attention on your own through social media, your website , and media connections.

12. Specialists and consultants

List any outside contractors you plan to retain, such as:

• General contractor
• PR and marketing

Briefly explain the services they’ll be providing for you, why you chose them, and any notable accomplishments.

13. Business structure

This section should be short and sweet. What type of business structure have you set up and why did you make that specific decision? You will need to work with an attorney to help you determine what business structure is best for you.

“Step one: write a business plan. Step two: hire a good attorney. In addition to helping me build a smart, sustainable business structure, my attorney was also a great resource for reviewing my business plan because she’s read thousands of them. She was a very helpful, experienced outside perspective for more than just legal matters,” says Charles Bililies.

14. Financial projections

Let your accountant guide you through this portion of your business plan. It is crucial that whoever you hire to help you with your finances has a wealth of restaurant experience (not just one or two places). They should be familiar with the financial specifics of starting a restaurant and know what questions to ask you.

Before creating realistic financial projections, your accountant will want to know:

• How many seats the restaurant will have
• What your average check will be
• How many covers per day you plan to do

Being conservative in these estimations is key. These three data points will be used as the basis for figuring out whether your concept is financially feasible.

Lou Guerrero, Principal at Kross, Baumgarten, Kniss & Guerrero, emphasizes, “You’ll get a lot of accountants that tell you that they’ve done a couple of restaurants, but you have to choose someone that has a deep expertise in what you’re doing. There’s nothing to gain from going with someone that doesn’t have a very restaurant-centric practice.”

A well-vetted accountant with restaurant experience will know exactly what you’ll need to have prepared to show investors.

The key projections you can expect to work on are:

• Pro forma profit and loss statement for the first three to five years of operation
• Break even analysis
• Capital requirements budget

Writing a comprehensive restaurant business plan is a crucial step towards opening a successful establishment. By seeking inspiration from examples, demonstrating your expertise, and addressing all the essential components, you can prove the viability of your concept to potential investors.

Remember, a well-prepared business plan demonstrates professionalism and a clear understanding of your goals, increasing your chances of achieving long-term success in the competitive restaurant industry.

Discover how OpenTable can take your business where you want to go

Take the Quiz

Explore more articles

• Restaurant reservation software
• Digital marketing solutions
• Restaurant table management
• Online ordering for restaurants
• Experiences
• Reputation and reviews
• Relationship management
• OpenTable integrations
• For restaurant groups
• For bars and wineries
• For hotels and casinos
• The best customer service
• Private dining
• Data & security
• Online waitlist
• Benchmark reporting
• Direct messaging
• About OpenTable
• New on OpenTable

Need help deciding which option is best for you? Give us a call at

(866) 951-7154

• Privacy Policy
• Terms of Use
• Cookies and Interest-Based Ads
• Do Not Sell My Info (California)

Earn a $500 gift card when an eligible restaurant you refer joins OpenTable*

*terms and conditions apply

Sling is now Sling by Toast! Learn more

More Features

• Restaurants
• Get Started

Restaurant Business Plan: What To Include, Plus 8 Examples

• Business Growth & Management , Templates & Guides

Do you want to ensure the success of your new foodservice endeavor? Write a restaurant business plan.

In this article, the experts at Sling tell you why a business plan is vital for both new and existing businesses and give you tips on what to include.

Table Of Contents

What Is A Restaurant Business Plan?

Why is a restaurant business plan important, questions to ask first, what to include in an effective restaurant business plan, how to format a restaurant business plan, efficient workforce management is essential for success.

At its most basic, a restaurant business plan is a written document that describes your restaurant’s goals and the steps you will take to make those goals a reality.

This business plan also describes the nature of the business itself, financial projections, background information, and organizational strategies  that govern the day-to-day activity of your restaurant.

A restaurant business plan is vital for the success of your endeavor because, without one, it is very difficult — sometimes even impossible — to obtain funding from an investor or a bank.

Without that all-important starting or operational capital, you may not be able to keep your doors open for long, if at all.

Even if funding isn’t a primary concern, a business plan provides you — the business owner or manager — with clear direction on how to translate general strategies into actionable plans  for reaching your goals.

The plan can help solidify everything from the boots-on-the-ground functional strategy  to the mid-level business strategy  all the way up to the driving-force corporate strategy .

Think of this plan as a roadmap that guides your way when things are going smoothly and, more importantly, when they aren’t.

If you want to give your restaurant the best chance for success, start by writing a business plan.

Sitting down to write a restaurant business plan can be a daunting task.

As you’ll see in the What To Include In An Effective Restaurant Business Plan section below, you’ll need a lot of information and detail to ensure that the final document is both complete and effective.

Instead of starting with word one, it is hugely beneficial to answer a number of general questions first.

These questions will help you narrow down the information to include in your plan so the composition process feels less difficult.

The questions are:

• What problem does the business’s product or service solve?
• What niche will the business fill?
• What is the business’s solution to the problem?
• Who are the business’s customers?
• How will the business market and sell its products to them?
• What is the size of the market for this solution?
• What is the business model for the business?
• How will the business make money?
• Who are the competitors?
• How will the business maintain a competitive advantage?
• How does the business plan to manage growth?
• Who will run the business?
• What makes those individuals qualified to do so?
• What are the risks and threats confronting the business?
• What can you do to mitigate those risks and threats?
• What are the business’s capital and resource requirements?
• What are the business’s historical and projected financial statements?

Depending on your business, some of these questions may not apply or you may not have applicable answers.

Nevertheless, it helps to think about, and try to provide details for, the whole list so your finished restaurant business plan is as complete as possible.

Once you’ve answered the questions for your business, you can transfer a large portion of that information to the business plan itself.

We’ll discuss exactly what to include in the next section.

In this section, we’ll show you what to include in an effective restaurant business plan and provide a brief example of each component.

1) Executive Summary

You should always start any business plan with an executive summary. This gives the reader a brief introduction into common elements, such as:

• Mission statement
• Overhead costs
• Labor costs
• Return on investment (ROI)

This portion of your plan should pique the reader’s interest and make them want to read more.

Fanty & Mingo’s is a 50-seat fine-dining restaurant that will focus on Sweruvian (Swedish/Peruvian) fusion fare.

We will keep overhead and labor costs low thanks to simple but elegant decor , highly skilled food-prep staff, and well-trained servers.

Because of the location and surrounding booming economy, we estimate ROI at 20 percent per annum.

2) Mission Statement

A mission statement is a short description of what your business does for its customers, employees, and owners.

This is in contrast to your business’s vision statement which is a declaration of objectives that guide internal decision-making.

While the two are closely related and can be hard to distinguish, it often helps to think in terms of who, what, why, and where.

The vision statement is the where of your business — where you want your business to be and where you want your customers and community to be as a result.

The mission statement is the who , what , and why of your business — it’s an action plan that makes the vision statement a reality

Here’s an example of a mission statement for our fictional company:

Fanty and Mingo’s takes pride in making the best Sweruvian food, providing fast, friendly, and accurate service. It is our goal to be the employer of choice and offer team members opportunities for growth, advancement, and a rewarding career in a fun and safe working environment.

3) Company Description

In this section of your restaurant business plan, you fully introduce your company to the reader. Every business’s company description will be different and include its own pertinent information.

Useful details to include are:

• Owner’s details
• Brief description of their experience
• Legal standing
• Short-term goals
• Long-term goals
• Brief market study
• An understanding of the trends in your niche
• Why your business will succeed in these market conditions

Again, you don’t have to include all of this information in your company description. Choose the ones that are most relevant to your business and make the most sense to communicate to your readers.

Fanty & Mingo’s will start out as an LLC, owned and operated by founders Malcolm Reynolds and Zoe Washburne. Mr. Reynolds will serve as managing partner and Ms. Washburne as general manager.

We will combine atmosphere, friendly and knowledgeable staff, and menu variety to create a unique experience for our diners and to reach our goal of high value in the fusion food niche.

Our gross margin is higher than industry average, but we plan to spend more on payroll to attract the best team.

We estimate moderate growth for the first two years while word-of-mouth about our restaurant spreads through the area.

4) Market Analysis

A market analysis is a combination of three different views of the niche you want to enter:

• The industry  as a whole
• The competition your restaurant will face
• The marketing  you’ll execute to bring in customers

This section should be a brief introduction to these concepts. You can expand on them in other sections of your restaurant business plan.

The restaurant industry in our chosen location is wide open thanks in large part to the revitalization of the city’s center.

A few restaurants have already staked their claim there, but most are bars and non-family-friendly offerings.

Fanty & Mingo’s will focus on both tourist and local restaurant clientele. We want to bring in people that have a desire for delicious food and an exotic atmosphere.

We break down our market into five distinct categories:

• High-end singles
• Businessmen and businesswomen

We will target those markets to grow our restaurant  by up to 17 percent per year.

Every restaurant needs a good menu, and this is the section within your restaurant business plan that you describe the food you’ll serve in as much detail as possible.

You may not have your menu design complete, but you’ll likely have at least a handful of dishes that serve as the foundation of your offerings.

It’s also essential to discuss pricing and how it reflects your overall goals and operating model. This will give potential investors and partners a better understanding of your business’s target price point and profit strategy.

We don’t have room to describe a sample menu in this article, but for more information on menu engineering, menu pricing, and even a menu template, check out these helpful articles from the Sling blog:

• Menu Engineering: What It Is And How It Can Increase Profits
• Restaurant Menu Pricing: 7 Tips To Maximize Profitability
• How To Design Your Menu | Free Restaurant Menu Template

6) Location

In this section, describe your potential location (or locations) so that you and your investors have a clear image of what the restaurant will look like.

Include plenty of information about the location — square footage, floor plan , design , demographics of the area, parking, etc. — to make it feel as real as possible.

We will locate Fanty & Mingo’s in the booming and rapidly expanding downtown sector of Fort Wayne, Indiana.

Ideally, we will secure at least 2,000 square feet of space with a large, open-plan dining room and rich color scheme near the newly built baseball stadium to capitalize on the pre- and post-game traffic and to appeal to the young urban professionals that live in the area.

Parking will be available along side streets and in the 1,000-vehicle parking garage two blocks away.

7) Marketing

The marketing section of your restaurant business plan is where you should elaborate on the information you introduced in the Market Analysis section.

Go into detail about the plans you have to introduce your restaurant to the public and keep it at the top of their mind.

Fanty & Mingo’s will employ three distinct marketing tactics to increase and maintain customer awareness:

• Word-of-mouth/in-restaurant marketing
• Partnering with other local businesses
• Media exposure

We will direct each tactic at a different segment of our potential clientele in order to maximize coverage.

In the process of marketing to our target audience, we will endeavor to harness the reach of direct mail and broadcast media, the exclusivity of the VIP party, and the elegance of a highly trained sommelier and wait staff.

8) Financials

Even though the Financials section is further down in your restaurant business plan, it is one of the most important components for securing investors and bank funding.

We recommend hiring a trained accountant  to help you prepare this section so that it will be as accurate and informative as possible.

Fanty & Mingo’s needs $250,000 of capital investment over the next year and a half for the following:

• Renovations to leased space
• Dining room furniture
• Kitchen and food-prep equipment
• Liquor license

Projected profit and loss won’t jump drastically in the first year, but, over time, Fanty & Mingo’s will develop its reputation and client base. This will lead to more rapid growth toward the third and fourth years of business.

Most entrepreneurs starting a new business find it valuable to have multiple formats of their business plan.

The information, data, and details remain the same, but the length and how you present them will change to fit a specific set of circumstances.

Below we discuss the four most common business plan formats to cover a multitude of potential situations.

Elevator Pitch

An elevator pitch is a short summary of your restaurant business plan’s executive summary.

Rather than being packed full of details, the elevator pitch is a quick teaser of sorts that you use on a short elevator ride (hence the name) to stimulate interest in potential customers, partners, and investors

As such, an effective elevator pitch is between 30 and 60 seconds and hits the high points of your restaurant business plan.

A pitch deck is a slide show and oral presentation that is designed to stimulate discussion and motivate interested parties to investigate deeper into your stakeholder plan (more on that below).

Most pitch decks are designed to cover the executive summary and include key graphs that illustrate market trends and benchmarks you used (and will use) to make decisions about your business.

Some entrepreneurs even include time and space in their pitch deck to demonstrate new products coming down the pipeline.

This won’t necessarily apply to a restaurant business plan, but, if logistics permit, you could distribute small samples of your current fare or tasting portions of new dishes you’re developing.

Stakeholder Plan (External)

A stakeholder plan is the standard written presentation that business owners use to describe the details of their business model to customers, partners, and potential investors.

The stakeholder plan can be as long as is necessary to communicate the current and future state of your business, but it must be well-written, well-formatted, and targeted at those looking at your business from the outside in.

Think of your stakeholder plan as a tool to convince others that they should get involved in making your business a reality. Write it in such a way that readers will want to partner with you to help your business grow.

Management Plan (Internal)

A management plan is a form of your restaurant business plan that describes the details that the owners and managers need to make the business run smoothly.

While the stakeholder plan is an external document, the management plan is an internal document.

Most of the details in the management plan will be of little or no interest to external stakeholders so you can write it with a higher degree of candor and informality.

After you’ve created your restaurant business plan, it’s time to take steps to make it a reality.

One of the biggest challenges in ensuring that your business runs smoothly and successfully is managing  and optimizing  your team. The Sling  app can help.

Sling not only includes powerful and intuitive artificial-intelligence-based scheduling tools but also many other features to help make your workforce management more efficient, including:

• Time and attendance tracking
• Built-in time clock
• Labor cost  optimization
• Data analysis and reporting
• Messaging and communication
• And much more…

With Sling, you can schedule faster, communicate better, and organize and manage your work from a single, integrated platform. And when you use Sling for all of your scheduling  needs, you’ll have more time to focus on bringing your restaurant business plan to life.

For more free resources to help you manage your business better, organize and schedule your team, and track and calculate labor costs, visit GetSling.com  today.

See Here For Last Updated Dates: Link

This content is for informational purposes and is not intended as legal, tax, HR, or any other professional advice. Please contact an attorney or other professional for specific advice.

Find the article useful? Share with others:

Related articles

How To Write Your Ideal Restaurant Mission Statement + 15 Inspiring Examples

Whether you run a one-person food cart, a small eatery with fewer than five empl...

12 Examples of Small Business Goals, Plus How to Achieve Your Own

Want to improve the way your business operates? Learn some of the more common bu...

55 Restaurant Marketing Tips To Win Your Market

Discover the best restaurant marketing tips and learn how you can harness onlin...

Get started today

Schedule faster, communicate better, get things done.

Restaurant Business Plan Template & PDF Example

• July 23, 2024
• Business Plan

Creating a comprehensive business plan is crucial for launching and running a successful restaurant. This plan serves as your roadmap, detailing your vision, operational strategies, and financial plan. It helps establish your restaurant’s identity, navigate the competitive market, and secure funding for growth.

This article not only breaks down the critical components of a restaurant business plan, but also provides an example of a business plan to help you craft your own.

Whether you’re an experienced entrepreneur or new to the food and beverage industry, this guide, complete with a business plan example, lays the groundwork for turning your restaurant concept into reality. Let’s dive in!

Our restaurant business plan is structured to cover all essential aspects needed for a comprehensive strategy. It outlines the restaurant’s operations, marketing strategy, market environment, competitors, management team, and financial forecasts.

• Executive Summary : Offers an overview of the restaurant’s business concept, market analysis , management, and financial strategy.
• Restaurant & Location: Describes the restaurant’s prime location, size, seating capacity, and distinctive design, emphasizing its appeal to the target demographic.
• Supply & Operations: Outlines the supply chain management, focusing on local sourcing and quality ingredients, and details the operational aspects, including kitchen layout, equipment, and front-of-house operations.
• Key Stats: Shares industry size , growth trends, and relevant statistics for the full-service restaurant market.
• Key Trends: Highlights recent trends affecting the restaurant sector, such as health-conscious dining, sustainability, and technology integration.
• Key Competitors: Analyzes the main competitors in the vicinity, showcasing the restaurant’s unique selling proposition in comparison.
• SWOT : Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats analysis.
• Marketing Plan : Strategies for promoting the restaurant to maximize visibility and customer engagement.
• Timeline : Key milestones and objectives from the initial setup through the launch and operational optimization.
• Management: Information on who manages the restaurant and their roles.
• Financial Plan: Projects the restaurant’s financial performance, including revenue, profits, and expected expenses, aiming for profitability and sustainable growth.

Restaurant Business Plan

Fully editable 30+ slides Powerpoint presentation business plan template.

Download an expert-built 30+ slides Powerpoint business plan template

Executive Summary

The Executive Summary introduces your restaurant’s business plan, offering a concise overview of your establishment and its offerings. It should detail your market positioning, the variety of cuisines and dining experiences you offer, its location, size, and an outline of day-to-day operations. 

This section should also explore how your restaurant will integrate into the local market, including the number of direct competitors within the area, identifying who they are, along with your restaurant’s unique selling points that differentiate it from these competitors. 

Furthermore, you should include information about the management and co-founding team, detailing their roles and contributions to the restaurant’s success. Additionally, a summary of your financial projections, including revenue and profits over the next five years, should be presented here to provide a clear picture of your restaurant’s financial plan.

Restaurant Business Plan Executive Summary Example

Business Overview

The  business overview  should detail the restaurant’s specific features, such as its seating capacity, ambiance, and supply chain practices. It’s important to emphasize how the restaurant caters to its target demographic through its strategic location and operational model.

Example: “[Your Restaurant Name],” located in [specific area or neighborhood], covers [total square footage] sq ft and includes a main dining area, bar, and outdoor patio, offering a total of [number of seats] seats. The restaurant’s commitment to quality is reflected in its locally sourced produce and sustainable supply chain practices, catering to a diverse clientele.

Market Overview

This section involves analyzing the size, growth, and trends of the full-service restaurant market. It should address the industry’s digital transformation, health-conscious dining preferences, and eco-friendly practices, positioning the restaurant within the broader market context.

Example: “[Your Restaurant Name]” enters a U.S. full-service restaurant market valued at $293 billion. The restaurant’s focus on technology, healthier menu options, and sustainability aligns well with current  market trends  and consumer preferences, setting it apart from six main competitors in the area.

Management Team

Detailing the management team’s background and expertise is crucial. This section should highlight how their experience in culinary arts and restaurant management contributes to the success of the restaurant.

Example: The Executive Chef and Co-Owner of “[Your Restaurant Name]” leads menu development and kitchen operations, ensuring high-quality food preparation and presentation. The General Manager and Co-Owner manages daily operations, staff, customer service, and financial aspects, ensuring a seamless dining experience.

Financial Plan

This section should outline the restaurant’s financial goals and projections, including revenue targets and profit margins, providing a clear picture of its financial aspirations and health.

Example: “[Your Restaurant Name]” aims to achieve $2.7 million in annual revenue with an 11%  EBITDA  margin by 2028. This financial goal is supported by a focus on quality dining experiences, strategic marketing, and operational efficiency, positioning the restaurant for growth in the  competitive  full-service restaurant market.

For a Restaurant, the Business Overview section can be concisely divided into 2 main slides:

Restaurant & Location

Briefly describe the restaurant’s physical environment, emphasizing its design, ambiance, and the overall dining experience it offers to guests. Mention the restaurant’s location, highlighting its accessibility and the convenience it offers to diners, such as proximity to entertainment venues or ease of parking. Explain why this location is advantageous in attracting your target clientele.

Supply & Operations

Detail the range of cuisines and dishes offered, from appetizers and main courses to desserts and specialty beverages. Outline your sourcing strategy, ensuring it reflects a commitment to quality and sustainability, and matches the market you’re targeting.

Highlight any unique culinary techniques, exclusive ingredients, or innovative kitchen technologies that set your restaurant apart. Discuss your operational strategies, including inventory management, supplier relationships, and kitchen workflow, to ensure efficiency and consistency in delivering exceptional dining experiences.

Industry size & growth

In the Market Overview of your restaurant business plan, start by examining the size of the restaurant industry and its growth potential. This analysis is crucial for understanding the market’s scope and identifying expansion opportunities.

Key market trends

Proceed to discuss recent market trends , such as the increasing consumer interest in farm-to-table dining, ethnic cuisines, and experiential dining experiences.

For example, highlight the demand for restaurants that offer unique cultural dishes, the growing popularity of health-conscious and dietary-specific menus, and the integration of technology in enhancing the dining experience.

Competitive Landscape

A  competitive analysis  is not just a tool for gauging the position of your restaurant in the market and its key competitors; it’s also a fundamental component of your business plan.

This analysis helps in identifying your restaurant’s unique selling points, essential for differentiating your business in a  competitive  market.

In addition, competitive analysis is integral in laying a solid foundation for your business plan. By examining various operational aspects of your competitors, you gain valuable information that ensures your business plan is robust, informed, and tailored to succeed in the current market environment.

Identifying Competitors in the Restaurant Industry

To comprehensively understand the competitive landscape, start by identifying both direct and indirect competitors in your area. Direct competitors are restaurants offering similar cuisines or targeting a comparable customer base. For instance, if your restaurant specializes in authentic Mexican cuisine, other nearby Mexican restaurants are direct competitors. Indirect competitors may include food trucks, cafes, or even fast-casual eateries offering diverse menus that overlap with your offerings.

Leverage digital tools like Google Maps, Yelp, or food delivery apps to map out the locations of your competitors. Reviews and ratings on platforms like TripAdvisor and social media can offer valuable insights into competitors’  strengths and weaknesses . Positive reviews highlighting exceptional service or a unique dining experience at a competitor’s restaurant can signify an area of focus for differentiation and improvement.

Restaurant Competitors’ Strategies

To conduct a comprehensive analysis, delve into various aspects of your competitors’ operations:

• Menu Offerings:  Assess the breadth and uniqueness of dishes offered by competitors. Take note if any local restaurants are gaining traction by focusing on farm-to-table ingredients, regional specialties, or offering innovative fusion cuisines, as these aspects often indicate emerging  market trends .
• Service and Ambiance:  Evaluate the overall customer experience. Identify if there’s a competitor renowned for its fine dining experience, another known for its trendy and vibrant atmosphere, or one that excels in providing a casual, family-friendly environment. These elements significantly contribute to a restaurant’s success and differentiation.
• Pricing and Positioning:  Compare pricing strategies . Determine whether competitors are positioned as budget-friendly eateries or if they adopt a more upscale approach with premium pricing, highlighting gourmet ingredients, or exclusive dining experiences.
• Marketing Channels :  Analyze how competitors market their restaurants. Do they leverage social media platforms for promotions, engage in collaborations with local influencers, or host special events or themed nights? Understanding their marketing tactics provides insights into effective promotional strategies that resonate with the  target audience .
• Operational Efficiency:  Observe if competitors have adopted technological advancements such as online reservations, mobile apps for ordering, or contactless payment systems. These innovations not only streamline operations but also contribute to an enhanced customer experience.

What’s Your Restaurant’s Value Proposition?

Reflect on what uniquely distinguishes your restaurant from the competition. It could be your innovative fusion of cuisines, a strong emphasis on locally sourced and sustainable ingredients, or perhaps a distinctive ambiance that reflects a particular cultural theme or historical narrative.

Listen attentively to customer feedback and observe emerging industry trends to identify gaps or unmet demands in the market. For instance, if there’s a growing interest in plant-based dining experiences and competitors have not tapped into this niche, it could present an opportunity for your restaurant to cater to this demand and stand out.

Consider how your restaurant’s location influences your strategy. A downtown location might warrant a focus on quick service and catering to office lunch crowds, while a suburban setting could embrace a more relaxed, family-friendly dining environment.

First, conduct a SWOT analysis for the restaurant , highlighting Strengths (such as a unique menu and exceptional customer service), Weaknesses (including potential high operational costs or strong competition in the area), Opportunities (for example, a growing interest in diverse cuisines and healthy eating), and Threats (such as economic downturns that may decrease consumer spending on dining out).

Marketing Plan

Next, develop a marketing strategy that outlines how to attract and retain customers through targeted advertising, promotional discounts, an engaging social media presence, food blogger outreach, and community involvement, such as local events or charity sponsorships.

Marketing Channels

Utilize various marketing channels to engage with your audience and attract new patrons.

Digital Marketing

• Social Media:  Utilize social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok to showcase your restaurant’s ambiance, signature dishes, behind-the-scenes glimpses, chef profiles, and customer testimonials. Regularly engage with your audience by responding to comments, hosting interactive polls, or sharing user-generated content.
• Email Marketing:  I mplement an email marketing strategy to build a loyal customer base. Offer incentives such as exclusive recipes, promotional offers, or early access to special events in exchange for subscribing to your newsletter. Regularly communicate with your subscribers, sharing updates, promotions, and stories that resonate with your brand.
• Website and SEO:  Maintain an  informative website showcasing your menu , chef profiles, reservation options, and reviews. Optimize it for local SEO to ensure visibility in searches related to your cuisine and location.

Local Advertising

• Printed Materials:  Distribute well-designed flyers in nearby neighborhoods, advertise in local magazines, and collaborate with tourism centers or hotels for exposure.
• Community Engagement:  Sponsor local events, collaborate with food bloggers or influencers, and participate in food festivals or charity events to increase brand visibility and community involvement.
• Partnerships:  Forge partnerships with complementary businesses (such as wine shops or local farmers’ markets) for cross-promotions or collaborative events.

Promotional Activities

Engage potential customers through enticing offers and events.

• Special Offers:  Launch promotions like ‘Chef’s Tasting Menu Nights’ or ‘Happy Hour Discounts’ to attract new diners and retain regulars.
• Loyalty Programs:  Implement a loyalty system offering rewards for frequent visits or referrals, such as a free appetizer or dessert after a certain number of visits.
• Events and Special Occasions:  Host themed nights, seasonal menus, or exclusive culinary events to create buzz and attract diverse audiences.

Sales Channels

Efficiently manage  sales channels  to maximize revenue and customer satisfaction.

In-Restaurant Upselling

• Menu Strategies:  Highlight premium dishes or chef’s specials, offer wine pairings or dessert suggestions, and train staff to upsell without being pushy.
• Merchandising:  Display branded merchandise, specialty sauces, or cookbooks for sale to complement the dining experience.

Online Ordering and Delivery

• Online Ordering Platform: I mplement an easy-to-use online ordering system for takeout or delivery orders. Offer exclusive online discounts or bundle deals.
• Delivery Partnerships:  Collaborate with food delivery services or establish in-house delivery for customers’ convenience.

Reservation Management

• Reservation System:  Utilize an efficient reservation platform to manage bookings. Offer incentives for off-peak reservations or special occasions.

Membership and VIP Programs

Developing membership and VIP programs can cultivate a loyal customer base and drive recurring revenue:

• VIP Memberships:  Create exclusive membership tiers offering perks like priority reservations, chef’s table access, or private event invitations.
• Reward Programs:  Develop a digital loyalty system where customers earn points for every dollar spent, redeemable for discounts, exclusive menu items, or special events.

Strategy Timeline

Finally, create a detailed timeline that outlines critical milestones for the restaurant’s opening, marketing campaigns, customer base growth, and expansion objectives, ensuring the business moves forward with clear direction and purpose.

The management section focuses on the restaurant’s management and their direct roles in daily operations and strategic direction. This part is crucial for understanding who is responsible for making key decisions and driving the restaurant towards its financial and operational goals.

For your restaurant business plan, list the core team members, their specific responsibilities, and how their expertise supports the business.

The Financial Plan section is a comprehensive analysis of your financial projections for revenue, expenses, and profitability. It lays out your restaurant’s approach to securing funding, managing cash flow, and achieving breakeven.

This section typically includes detailed forecasts for the first 5 years of operation, highlighting expected revenue, operating costs and capital expenditures.

For your restaurant business plan, provide a snapshot of your financial statement (profit and loss, balance sheet, cash flow statement), as well as your key assumptions (e.g. number of customers and prices, expenses, etc.).

Make sure to cover here _ Profit and Loss _ Cash Flow Statement _ Balance Sheet _ Use of Funds

Related Posts

Steakhouse Business Plan Template & PDF Example

• July 24, 2024

Bubble Tea Business Plan Template & PDF Example

Bar Business Plan Template & PDF Example

• July 22, 2024

Privacy Overview

Restaurant Business Plan: Step-by-Step Guide + examples

Dreaming of opening a 🍴 restaurant? Passion, creativity, and delicious food are key. But for long-term success, a business plan is essential too.

Maja Jankowska

Are you dreaming of owning your own restaurant? Picture the sizzle of a hot skillet, the laughter of satisfied guests, and the fulfillment of sharing your culinary creations with the world. But before you dive into this flavorful adventure, there’s a crucial ingredient you can’t overlook: a winning restaurant business plan.

What is a business plan for?

A business plan is a vital document for every restaurant owner. It provides a roadmap for success, helps secure funding, guides financial and operational decisions, mitigates risks, and facilitates effective communication. 

Just like any other business, a restaurant needs a well-crafted business plan to ensure its success and sustainability. Without a business plan, you risk operating in the dark, making decisions on a whim, and facing unexpected challenges that could have been avoided. 

Investing time and effort into creating a solid business plan sets your restaurant on the path to achieving your culinary dreams and exceeding customer expectations.

Create Restaurant’s Business Plan in these 9 steps:

✔️ 1. Start with an executive summary ✔️ 2. Describe your concept ✔️ 3. Conduct Market analysis ✔️ 4. Define your management and organization ✔️ 5. Give a sample “yummy”  Menu ✔️ 6. Create design and branding ✔️ 7. Provide a Location ✔️ 8. Establish Marketing plan ✔️ 9. Define Financial plan

1. Executive summary

The executive summary is like the appetizer of your restaurant business plan – it’s the first bite that leaves a lasting impression. Its purpose is to capture the essence of your entire plan and entice time-crunched reviewers, such as potential investors and lenders, to delve deeper into your vision. It’s worth noting that the executive summary should be the final section you write.

To craft a concise and captivating summary, it’s crucial to highlight key points, including your unique concept, target market, and financial projections. Additionally, bear in mind that the executive summary sets the tone for the rest of your plan, so it’s essential to make it irresistible and leave readers yearning for more.

When it comes to the executive summary of your restaurant business plan, brevity is key . You have only one page to capture the attention of readers, but don’t worry, it’s definitely doable. Here’s what your executive summary should include:

• Restaurant concept : What does your business do?
• Goals and vision : What does your business want to achieve?
• Restaurant differentiation : What makes your menu/concept different, and what sets you apart?
• Projected financial state : What revenue do you anticipate?
• The team : Who is involved in the business?

2. Describe your concept

In the world of restaurant business plans, there’s a section that holds immense importance. It’s the one that answers two fundamental questions: Who are you, and what do you plan to do?

This is the section where you fully introduce your company, and it deserves special attention. Share all the important details that paint a vivid picture of your unique business. Include the restaurant’s name, location, and contact information. Additionally, provide relevant details such as the chef’s background and what makes your restaurant stand out in the market.

Curious about concept creation? Watch our short video featuring a summary of an example restaurant concept below! 👇

Now is your opportunity to showcase your vision and establish a unique identity for your restaurant. Utilize this section to highlight what sets you apart and capture the reader’s imagination.

3. Market analysis

Market analysis helps you understand your potential customers, competition, and overall restaurant market trends. It’s like having a crystal ball to shape your restaurant’s success.

Target audience 

When it comes to your potential market, you want to know how many people are hungry for what you’re serving. Sounds exciting, right? To estimate this, you’ll gather data on your target customers, like their age group or preferences, and combine it with industry trends. It’s like finding the perfect recipe to satisfy their cravings.

Competition

Now, let’s tackle the competition. Every restaurant has rivals, even if they’re serving a unique dish. It’s crucial to identify direct or indirect competitors and understand what makes you stand out. Are you offering affordable prices, a one-of-a-kind experience, or catering to a specific niche? Highlight your “secret sauce” that sets you apart from the rest.

Market analysis for restaurant’s business plan

Market analysis also involves a SWOT analysis. Don’t let the jargon scare you. It simply means evaluating your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Think of it as a superhero assessment for your restaurant. Identify what you excel at, areas for improvement, potential market opportunities, and external factors that could impact your success.

Example of SWOT analysis for a restaurant

Remember, market analysis is like a compass guiding your restaurant’s journey. It helps you make informed decisions, attract investors, and stay ahead of the game. So, embrace the power of market analysis, and let it shape the destiny of your delicious dining destination.

4. Management and organization

Effective management and organization are critical for success in the restaurant sector. This section of your business plan introduces the talented individuals who will lead your restaurant to new heights.

Outline your legal structure, whether it’s an S corporation, limited partnership, or sole proprietorship, providing key information for stakeholders.

Showcase your management team using an organizational chart to highlight their roles, responsibilities, and contributions. Their expertise and guidance are crucial for seamless operations and exceptional customer experiences.

With a strong management team in place, your restaurant is poised for success. They are the driving force behind your journey to greatness. Let’s meet the key players who will make it happen!

Streamline your operations and optimize your financial performance With resOs , you can efficiently manage reservations, track inventory, analyze sales data, and streamline your overall workflow. Get your FREE plan

5. Sample “yummy” Menu 

In the restaurant industry, your menu plays a main role as the core product. Include a section in your business plan that highlights key details about your menu offerings to engage readers.

If you offer a diverse range of dishes, provide a brief overview of each category. Alternatively, if your menu focuses on specific specialties or signature dishes, provide more detailed descriptions for each item.

You can also mention any upcoming menu additions or unique culinary creations that will enhance profitability and attract customers.

6. Design and branding 

When it comes to starting a restaurant, don’t underestimate the power of design and branding. They’re the secret ingredients that can make your establishment truly stand out. Think about it – when customers walk through your front door, what do they see? The right design and branding can instantly captivate their attention and make them feel right at home.

So, take some time to envision the overall aesthetic and mood you want to create.

Do you imagine a cozy and rustic setting or a sleek and modern vibe?

Let your creativity shine through! Include captivating photos of similar restaurants that inspire you and give potential investors a glimpse of your vision.

And don’t forget about your logo! If you’ve already designed one, proudly showcase it in your business plan. It’s the visual representation of your restaurant’s personality and will help establish brand recognition.

resOS’ customizable interface for your booking system

Stand out in the competitive restaurant industry with resOS’ customizable booking management system . Personalize every aspect of the interface to reflect your restaurant’s unique brand identity. Seamlessly integrate your logo, colors, and visual elements, creating a cohesive and immersive experience for your guests. With resOS, you have the power to revolutionize your restaurant’s image and leave a lasting impression.

Details matter too! Share your plans for specific design elements , from the choice of furniture to the color palette that will adorn your space. The more you paint a vivid picture, the more investors and customers will be enticed by your unique ambiance.

7. Location

For a restaurant, location can make or break the business. Occasionally, a restaurant concept is so good that people go out of their way to find it. But, more realistically, your location needs to be convenient for your target market. If it’s hard for your customers to get to you, hard for them to park, and not something they notice as they drive by, they’re unlikely to check your restaurant out.

In your business plan, make sure to discuss the potential locations that you hope to occupy, assuming you haven’t already secured the location. Explain why the location is ideal for your target market and how the location will help attract customers.

Unlock the potential of your restaurant’s location and streamline reservations with resOS. Our platform offers seamless integration with Reserve With Google , allowing customers to easily discover and book tables directly from Google search results and maps. By enabling this feature, you’ll maximize your restaurant’s visibility and attract more diners with just a few clicks. Experience the power of location-based reservations with resOS .

Be sure to explain the complete costs of your location and what kinds of renovations will be necessary to open your restaurant.

8. Marketing plan

In today’s competitive restaurant industry, it’s important to showcase your marketing strategy to investors. They want to know how you’ll create buzz and keep it going before and after your grand opening.

Create a winning business plan with a strong marketing focus. Our Restaurant Business Plan Steps Graphic (👆 see above) is your visual guide, including key marketing strategies. Download or save for later and plan your path to success.

Whether you’ve enlisted a top-notch Marketing company or have a solid ready-to-go marketing plan, highlight your chosen path. Discuss the unique strengths of your selected agency and why they stand out, including their notable clients. Alternatively, showcase your in-house plan, leveraging social media, your website, and valuable media connections.

A well-crafted marketing plan holds the key to differentiating your restaurant and attracting customers. Prepare to tantalize taste buds and offer an exceptional dining experience. Stay in tune with the latest restaurant industry trends, leverage effective marketing tools, and optimize your online presence. 

Lastly, integrate a robust restaurant booking system to streamline reservations and enhance the overall customer experience. With these strategic elements in place, success is within your reach.

9. Financial Plan

Financial analysis is a crucial part of your restaurant’s business plan. It helps investors assess the profitability of your concept and whether it’s a worthwhile investment. In this section, you’ll outline how you plan to allocate your funds in the first year and provide projections for costs and revenues.

Here are the 🔑 key components to include:

Investment Plan: Explain the initial investment costs, such as kitchen equipment, furniture, employee wages, legal fees, marketing expenses, and working capital. This shows how you’ll use your funds effectively.

Profit and Loss Projection: Estimate your restaurant’s costs and sales figures in the profit and loss statement. Consider factors like the size of your establishment, your target market, and the existing competition in your chosen location.

Break-Even Analysis: Show investors the monthly revenue you need to achieve to cover all your expenses and reach profitability. This analysis considers overhead costs, operational expenses, and factors that may affect revenue fluctuations throughout the year.

Claim your FREE plan on resOS today! Ready to revolutionize your business management? Join resos.com for FREE and take control of your operations. ✅ Seamless calendar integration ✅ Customizable booking forms ✅ Automated reminders ✅ Real-time availability updates Don’t miss out! Sign up now at resos.com and experience stress-free scheduling. Your time is valuable, so claim your FREE plan today!

Latest from the blog

Restaurant Management Software — The Ultimate Guide

Restaurant management software: The ultimate guide for owners Running a restaurant is no easy task. Between juggling reservations, managing inventory, and keeping your staff on schedule, it can quickly become overwhelming. That’s where restaurant management...

Review trends and behaviours in the restaurant and hospitality industry

Stay ahead in the restaurant industry by mastering online reviews and customer behavior. Learn actionable strategies to improve your reputation and attract more diners

Maximize your restaurant’s success with Google Reviews 

Boost your restaurant's reputation and attract customers with Google Reviews. Discover how positive feedback builds trust and drives business success. 🍽️📈

How to Write a Small Restaurant Business Plan + Free Sample Plan PDF

Makenna Crocker

10 min. read

Updated March 18, 2024

Free Download:  Sample Restaurant Business Plan Template

From greasy spoon diners to Michelin Star restaurants, food service has captured the hearts and imaginations of countless culinary entrepreneurs.

In the United States, 90% of restaurant owners operate small restaurants with fewer than 50 employees . And 70% operate in just one location.

If you’re passionate about food and dream of opening a restaurant, you have plenty of company. But cooking skills alone won’t cut it. You need a plan.

In this article, we’ll walk you through writing a small restaurant business plan, from conducting market research to developing promotional strategies and creating a financial forecast. 

Need more guidance? Download our free small restaurant business plan template .

Why write a small restaurant business plan?

Starting a restaurant from scratch isn’t cheap.  Startup costs range from $175,000 to $750,000 and include hefty upfront expenses like:

• Building lease
• Kitchen equipment
• Ingredient sourcing

The financials section of a business plan gives you space to compile these costs into an expense budget and compare them to your revenue projections . These will be invaluable in helping you determine if your restaurant concept is financially viable.

And if you need a bank loan or investor to help fund your restaurant , they’ll want to see a plan that includes financial projections (more on that later).

Brought to you by

Create a professional business plan

Using ai and step-by-step instructions.

Secure funding

Validate ideas

Build a strategy

• How to write a small restaurant business plan

The business plan is not only where you lay out your plan, vision, and goals for the restaurant – it pushes you to thoroughly research and understand your market , competitors , and customers to make informed decisions. It guides you through the intricacies of opening and running a small restaurant and helps you keep your finances in order.

Here are some tips for writing a small restaurant business plan that sets you up for success.

• Start with a company overview

A good place to start is to think about the big picture. What do you want your restaurant to be? Are you envisioning upscale dining in a candlelit, intimate setting? Or maybe you’re going for comfort food in a family-friendly atmosphere?

Capture the essence of your restaurant with a brief, attention-grabbing overview. Think of the start of your overview section as an elevator pitch. You’re introducing your concept and vision to highlight what will make your business unique .

Just keep it succinct. 

You’ll need to include other important information about your business here, such as the legal structure of your business and the qualifications of you and your management team.

If you’re writing a business for an existing restaurant, you should also cover its history – when the restaurant was founded, who was involved, and milestones it has reached.

• Understand your target market

Conducting a thorough market analysis is key to the success of your small restaurant. In an industry as competitive as the restaurant business, you’ll need to have your finger on the pulse of your dining market if you hope to create a unique offering.

Defining your target market is essential when starting your restaurant, helping answer questions like:

• Is there demand in the local market for your food?
• Who are your primary competitors? 
• Is there building space for lease near where your target customers live or work?
• What types of partnerships with food distributors (wholesalers, farmers, butchers, etc.) will be needed to ensure a steady flow of fresh ingredients?

The first step is to identify who your diners will be. 

It’s unrealistic to try to appeal to every single customer. So, ask yourself who you envision walking through your doors. Are they:

• Adults aged 40 and over, with lots of disposable income and exotic culinary tastes.
• Children, young adults, and families looking for quick, convenient food that doesn’t stretch their budgets.

Of course, these aren’t the only two customer demographics for a restaurant. But you should get the sense that these customer segments have very different preferences.

Read more: Target market example

Understanding your target market involves more than just demographics. Consider their:

• Spending habits
• Daily routines

If you plan to operate in a busy city center, your target market might include working professionals seeking quick lunch options or upscale dining options after work. But if you’re opening in a less visible area near residential neighborhoods, you may be more likely to target families.

• Size up your competition

With a target customer in mind, you need to understand who you’ll be competing with for their dining budget.

Analyzing your competitors is about understanding their strengths, weaknesses, and strategies. 

Start by identifying direct competitors (other small restaurants) and indirect competitors (like fast-food chains or food trucks). Observe how they attract customers, the ambiance they create, and the variety and pricing of their menus.

Get a feel for their operational strategies:

• How much staffing do they have?
• How fast (or slow) is their service?
• What kinds of supplier relationships do they seem to have?

And their marketing tactics :

• How do they engage with customers?
• What deals or promotions do they offer?
• What kind of reviews are they getting online?

Finally, think about their long-term position: 

• Have they expanded or downsized recently?
• Have they changed their operating hours?
• Have they changed their menu?

As you observe these competitors and their customers, ask yourself what they are doing right and where they are coming up short. 

This knowledge will help you identify gaps in the market and opportunities to offer a unique experience.

• Create a detailed operations plan

With so many moving pieces to manage as a restaurant owner, writing an operations plan is just as important as creating a market analysis.

The operations section of your business plan details how your restaurant will function daily. 

It should briefly touch on every aspect of running the business–from staffing needs to how often you will need to buy new ingredients, kitchen equipment, or dining utensils.

Your operations plan will reflect the unique needs of your business, but a typical restaurant operations plan might include:

• Staffing and training: Lay out a staffing plan, with the roles and responsibilities of each team member. Include strategies for hiring, training, and employee retention.
• Equipment and technology: Outline your dining, kitchen, and technology needs, from tables and chairs to ovens and point-of-sale systems.
• Supply chain management: Explain your ingredient sourcing and inventory management strategies and your plan to build relationships with suppliers.
• Customer service policies: Describe how you manage customer service needs and feedback to ensure a positive dining experience.
• Health and safety protocols: Detail procedures for maintaining kitchen hygiene practices and food handling standards to ensure food safety and compliance with health regulations.

Without an operations plan, you’ll lack a documented strategy for managing your kitchen workflow, maintaining customer satisfaction, or even basic tasks like inventory or staffing.

And if you’re writing a business plan to get a bank loan or investment , they’ll want to see that you have a plan for successfully managing the restaurant. 

• Actively market your restaurant

Your small restaurant may serve the most mouthwatering dishes in town, but no one will discover it without effective promotional strategies. 

You need to develop a comprehensive marketing plan to showcase your culinary delights and entice customers through your doors.

Consider both traditional and digital marketing channels to reach your target audience. Traditional methods may include:

• Hosting special events
• Participating in local food festivals
• Partnering with complementary businesses in your community

Digital strategies may include:

• Creating an engaging website
• Building a strong presence on social media platforms
• Utilizing online review platforms to build credibility and foster positive word-of-mouth.

When developing your promotional strategies, consider the following tips:

Be smart about your online presence

Build a visually appealing and user-friendly website that showcases your restaurant’s ambiance, menu, and story. 

Leverage social media platforms to engage with your audience, share enticing food photos, and run targeted advertising campaigns.

Consider promotions

Encourage repeat business by implementing a loyalty program that rewards customers for their patronage. Offer incentives such as discounts to certain customer segments, like seniors, veterans, or students.

Engage with the local community

Participate in community events, sponsor local sports teams or charity initiatives, and establish partnerships with neighboring businesses. 

Becoming an active community member will build brand awareness and loyalty.

Don’t ignore your pricing and financial strategy

According to data from the National Restaurant Association , about 60% of restaurants fail in their first year, and 80% close within five years.

You need to understand your startup and ongoing operating expenses to run a successful small restaurant.

Start by estimating your startup costs , including:

• Site acquisition (down payment if owning the space, initial payment if leasing)
• Building improvements
• Equipment purchases
• Licenses and permits
• Initial inventory
• Menu creation

Then, account for ongoing operating expenses, such as:

• Employee wages
• Mortgage or rent payments
• Ingredient costs

Pricing your menu items strategically is essential to ensuring profitability. Analyze ingredient costs, consider portion sizes, and compare prices in your local market to determine competitive yet profitable pricing.

Conduct a break-even analysis to determine the number of customers you need to serve to cover costs and start generating profits. Regularly review your financials and adjust your pricing as needed to maintain a healthy bottom line.

Consider these financial aspects when developing your small restaurant business plan:

Budget Allocation

Determine how you will allocate your budget across different areas of your restaurant, such as kitchen equipment, interior design, marketing, and staff training.

Prioritize investments that will have a direct impact on customer experience and operational efficiency.

Revenue Streams

Identify multiple revenue streams for your restaurant. This may include revenue from food sales, catering services, private events, or partnerships with local businesses.

Diversifying your revenue sources can help stabilize your cash flow.

Cost Control

Develop strategies to control costs without compromising quality. Efficient inventory management, negotiation with suppliers, and staff training on waste reduction can contribute to cost savings.

Sales Forecasting

Create a sales forecast based on your market research, pricing strategy, and seating capacity. Consider seasonal fluctuations and special events that may impact your restaurant’s performance.

Other information to include in your small restaurant business plan

As a restaurant owner, a few components of your business plan are unique to your industry. 

None of these fit neatly into any one section of a business plan. We suggest addressing them in additional sections or within the appendix .

Restaurant location and layout

Include information about your restaurant’s location . 

Some of this information will be included in your market analysis, but once you’ve secured a location, you should go deeper and analyze factors like:

• Rent and utilities
• Foot traffic
• Parking availability
• Nearby businesses

Explaining the layout of your restaurant – especially your kitchen – is also important. Consider adding photos or diagrams of each room to your plan. 

Diagrams can be especially helpful. You can add in-depth details for seating arrangements in the dining room or how staff should move efficiently throughout the kitchen.

What do many people do before deciding whether to eat at a restaurant? 

They look at the menu.

You can gain or lose customers on the strength of your menu. It affects numerous business areas, from marketing to pricing and operations.

For instance, if you’re running a family-friendly restaurant but your prices are too high, people will see that on your menu and may decide to eat somewhere cheaper. 

On the other hand, if you’re running a fine dining restaurant , but your menu fails to describe your dishes in an appealing way, diners may go somewhere they perceive as having higher quality meals.

That makes the business plan a great place to create menu concepts. 

You can experiment with different offerings, price points, and menu designs until you’re confident about sharing them with customers. 

And since business plans are continuously updated as your business changes—you can see how your menu has changed over time and what’s been most successful.

Download your free small restaurant business plan template

If you’re ready to start a restaurant, you can download our free small restaurant business plan template from our library of over 550 sample business plans . 

Get started today, and discover why businesses that plan grow 30% faster than those that don’t .

More restaurant business plan examples:

• Food truck business plan
• Coffee shop business plan
• Bakery business plan
• Brewery business plan

Makenna Crocker is the Marketing Specialist at Richardson Sports. Her work focuses on market and social trends, crafting gripping and authentic content, and enhancing marketing strategy to foster stronger B2B and B2C relationships. With a master’s degree in Advertising and Brand Responsibility from the University of Oregon, she specializes in generating a strong and responsible brand presence through content that positively influences and inspires others.

Table of Contents

• Why you need a plan
• Don’t ignore your pricing and financial strategy
• Additional info to include
• Free business plan template

Related Articles

6 Min. Read

How to Write a Nail Salon Business Plan + Free Sample Plan PDF

9 Min. Read

How to Write a Business Plan for a Service Business

10 Min. Read

How to Write an eCommerce Business Plan + Template

7 Min. Read

How to Write a Food and Beverage Business Plan + Sample Business Plan PDF

The LivePlan Newsletter

Become a smarter, more strategic entrepreneur.

Your first monthly newsetter will be delivered soon..

Unsubscribe anytime. Privacy policy .

The quickest way to turn a business idea into a business plan

Fill-in-the-blanks and automatic financials make it easy.

No thanks, I prefer writing 40-page documents.

Discover the world’s #1 plan building software

From Idea to Foundation

Master the Essentials: Laying the Groundwork for Lasting Business Success. 

Funding and Approval Toolkit

Shape the future of your business, business moves fast. stay informed..

Discover the Best Tools for Business Plans

Learn from the business planning experts, resources to help you get ahead, how to write a restaurant business plan, the ultimate guide to planning your restaurant, your recipe for success.

Elevate your restaurant or cafe’s business plan with our expert-curated resources. Our tools are tailored to help you secure funding, gain approval, and build a strong foundation.

Who is this for?

4 key things to do before you begin writing your restaurant business plan.

So, you think you’re ready to dive into the restaurant biz? Hold up. Before you start fantasizing about your grand opening, there’s groundwork to be laid. And I’m not just talking about choosing which trendy aprons your staff will wear. Here are the four non-negotiable steps you need to tackle before you even think about drafting that business plan.

1. Figure Out Your Concept and Brand Identity

What’s your story? And no, “I want to open a restaurant” doesn’t cut it. Are you bringing the sultry tastes of New Orleans to the heart of New York? Or maybe you’re thinking of a vegan joint that even hardcore carnivores can’t resist? That’s your concept. Now, how will you sell it? That’s your brand. It’s not just about what’s on the plate; it’s about the vibe, the ethos, the whole shebang. Your concept and brand identity are what will set you apart from the “just another café” down the street. Got it?

2. Get a Grip on Locations and Logistics

Location, location, location – it’s not just a tired cliché. It’s the make-or-break factor for your restaurant dream. But here’s the kicker: some landlords want to see your business plan before they hand over the keys. It’s a bit of a chicken-and-egg situation, isn’t it? But fear not. This is where your concept shines. It gives landlords a taste of what’s to come, making them more likely to bet on your vision. And logistics? Start thinking about supply chains, kitchen flow, and whether your delivery guy will get stuck in traffic during rush hour. Thrilling, I know.

3. Menu Planning

Ah, the menu – the heart of your restaurant. This is where you get to flex your culinary muscles. But let’s not get carried away with truffle oil just yet. Your menu needs to be a carefully balanced equation of cost, creativity, and logistics. It should scream your brand, cater to your target demographic, and, above all, be feasible. Remember, a great concept with a poorly executed menu is like a smartphone with no battery life – useless.

4. Regulation and Licensing

Dreaming of a chic cocktail lounge to complement your restaurant? You better make sure you can secure that liquor license first. Regulations and licensing are the less glamorous side of the restaurant business, but they’re as crucial as the food you serve. This step is about dotting your i’s and crossing your t’s. Health inspections, food handler certifications, zoning laws – welcome to the bureaucratic maze. Navigate it successfully, and you’re one step closer to pouring those artisanal cocktails.

The Absolute Power of a Killer Restaurant Business Plan

Listen up, future restaurateurs! Why do you need a restaurant business plan that’s more detailed than your grandma’s recipe for lasagna? Simple. It’s the GPS for navigating the wild terrain of the restaurant industry. You’re not just opening a place where people eat; you’re stepping into a battlefield where only the strongest concepts thrive. You think you’ve got what it takes? Then you better have a plan that screams, “Invest in me, I’m going places!”

The Must-Haves of Your Restaurant Business Plan

Crafting this masterpiece involves more than jotting down some numbers and a catchy name. It’s about painting a picture so vivid, investors can taste your dishes just by reading the pages.

Executive Summary

This isn’t your high school book report. It’s the hook that grabs investors by their taste buds. Who are you? What’s your vibe? And why is your place going to be the new hotspot? 

Conceptualizing Your Offering

Are you the oasis for vegan foodies, or the haven for carnivores seeking their next meaty conquest? Define your universe. 

Dive deep into your menu. Why? Because your truffle mac ‘n cheese is going to revolutionize how we think about comfort food, that’s why.  

Location, Location, Location

Explain why your spot is the place to be. Is it the foot traffic, the local vibe, or because it’s an area screaming for a culinary revolution?  

Market Analysis

Who’s coming to eat? What’s the competition? And why’s your restaurant the answer to everyone’s food prayers? 

Strategy & Implementation

How are you going to fill those seats? If “If you build it, they will come” is your only plan, we need to talk. 

Management Dream Team

Who’s running the show? Why are they rock stars? 

Financial Genius

Show me the money – your startup costs, projections, and that magic break-even point. 

Might throw in a curveball or two, like the tech that’ll make your service smoother than a soufflé or the loyalty program that keeps ’em coming back for more. Custom-tailor your plan. This isn’t a one-size-fits-all kind of deal.

Why Sweating the Small Stuff Makes All the Difference

In the cutthroat culinary world, it’s the little things. Your business plan isn’t just a document; it’s your manifesto. It’s what sets you apart in a sea of sameness. Think of it as your restaurant’s DNA – from analyzing your market to breaking down your cash flow. This level of detail doesn’t just impress financiers; it gives you a map through the industry’s maze.

Ready, Set, Pre-Plan!

Think writing a restaurant business plan is your first step? Think again. Before you start dreaming up menu items or picking out tablecloths, there’s something crucial you need to tackle: our Pre-Planning Process . This isn’t just a preliminary step; it’s the foundation on which your entire concept will be built. Want to know more? We’ve laid out every detail on our website. Start Your Journey Here. Alongside the essential tasks to tackle before penning your plan, these resources are invaluable.

The Pre-Planning Process for Restaurant Entrepreneurs

Before the dream becomes reality, there’s the Pre-Planning Process. Think of it as the appetizer to the main course that is your restaurant. This phase is where your vision gets a reality check. Is your brilliant idea in sync with the market? Can it make you money? Let’s chop it up into bite-sized pieces.

Know Your Customer

Who’s sitting at your tables? Getting this right is like nailing the perfect spice blend. Use Pre-Vision Interviews and the Jobs-to-be-Done theory to decode your customers’ cravings. This isn’t just about filling bellies; it’s about fulfilling needs, wants, and dreams on a plate.

Get the full recipe on understanding your customer.

Core Cost Analysis

Next up: the dough. Can your restaurant make financial sense? Break down the costs like a recipe, from ingredients (goods) to chef’s time (labor). It’s all about balancing quality and cost to price your menu right.

Dive into the numbers with our Core Cost Analysis guide.

Business Model Development

Here’s where you sketch out your restaurant’s blueprint using the Business Model Canvas. Mix in customer insights, sprinkle in financial realities, and what do you get? A strategy that’s as solid as your signature dish.

Layer your business model with our development tools.  

Operations in Detail

Operations are the kitchen of your business. It’s where plans meet reality. From picking your team to setting up supplier ties, every choice cooks up the customer experience you’re aiming for.

Whisk through operational planning essentials here.

Startup and Operating Costs

Before the grand opening comes the bill. Understanding the full cost menu—from initial setup to the daily specials—is crucial. It sets up your pricing strategy and opens doors to investors.

Season your financial planning with our Startup and Operating Costs guide.

Now, assuming you’ve got the pre-planning in your rearview, it’s time to talk about step two: actually writing that killer restaurant business plan. This is where your concept starts to take shape, grounded in the gritty realities of the restaurant world and buoyed by your boundless passion. 

Get Up to Speed FAST!

Unsure where to start.

Actually Writing a Perfect Restaurant Business Plan

Okay, so you’re really, really, truly ready to write your restaurant business plan? Our resources guide you through, soup to nuts. Visit our Plan & Pitch section and start cooking up your success story, which will take you through the following steps: 

Understanding Audiences

Knowing who will be reading your business plan is half the battle. Customize your pitch to echo in the halls of banks, impress investors, comply with regulators, charm partners, or convince landlords. Your message needs to land with impact.

Get the right structure for your audience.

Model-Based Planning®

Our Model-Based Planning® slices through the noise, offering a strategic blueprint for any restaurant concept, from a cozy café to a bustling food truck. Embrace a bird’s-eye view of your business terrain, sharpening your concept and competitive edge.

Explore Model-Based Planning®.

Narrative Development

A story well told is a story that sells. Weave your restaurant’s vision, strategy, and USP into a narrative that captivates and convinces, laying a solid foundation for your pitch.

Craft your story.

Dish out a thorough market analysis to understand your competition, the industry trends, and the economic landscape. This is your compass for navigating towards success in the restaurant sector.

Dive into market analysis.

Organizational Structure

The backbone of any successful restaurant is its team. Chart out your organizational structure and pen down compelling team biographies that demonstrate capability and credibility to potential backers.

Build your team structure.

Financial Projections

Serving up a detailed financial forecast is essential. It’s your map for budgeting, setting prices, and securing the dough (funding, that is).

Forecast your finances.

Turn your concept into a full-blown plan with actionable strategies for marketing, sales, and customer delight. A well-seasoned marketing plan ensures you hit your targets and satisfy customer appetites.

Strategize and execute.

Pitch Deck & Finances

An irresistible pitch deck and savvy financial management are your secret ingredients for attracting early-stage investment and securing a smooth launch.

Perfect your investor pitch.

Unlock the Power of Expert Business Planning

Supercharge your restaurant's success.

Our Expert Business Planning Bundle, curated specifically for restaurant entrepreneurs, is a comprehensive toolkit with everything you need to create a winning business plan.

This bundle includes the Model-Based Planning® Worksheet, a professional financial projection Excel model, and expert guides on leveraging these tools and AI to develop your plan. Don’t miss this opportunity to invest in your restaurant’s future and watch your vision come to life.

Gain an Unfair Advantage

The tools you need.

This bundle was created by the top business planning team in the U.S., responsible for the most successful business plan writing company in history. By leveraging these expert resources and insider secrets specific to restaurant planning, you’ll be able to create a standout business plan that sets you apart from the competition.

With this bundle, you will:

• Access the insider knowledge and proven strategies used by the most successful business planning company in the U.S.
• Leverage expert resources tailored specifically to the restaurant industry, giving you a competitive edge
• Streamline your planning process with the Model-Based Planning® Worksheet for Restaurants and Cafes
• Create professional financial projections using the included Excel model
• Utilize the curated restaurant-focused business plan template to structure and organize your plan effectively
• Follow expert guides on leveraging these tools and AI to develop a compelling and comprehensive business plan
• Dramatically increase your chances of securing the loans, investments, or approvals you need to bring your restaurant vision to life

Use this bundle as your primary toolkit for crafting a restaurant business plan that unlocks the funding and support you need.

When crafting a business plan for your restaurant or cafe, you need more than just a generic template. You need a toolkit carefully curated by industry experts who have spent their careers helping restaurants succeed. That’s exactly what our Expert Business Planning Bundle offers, but why invest in this bundle when there are other options available?

The answer is simple: no other resource can match the depth, breadth, and practical wisdom contained in our Expert Business Planning Bundle. Our team has distilled their thousands of hours of experience working with successful restaurants into a comprehensive toolkit that will save you time, money, and the frustration of making costly mistakes.

With our targeted, practical knowledge tailored specifically to the restaurant industry, you’ll be able to write a business plan that’s smarter than what the best consultants could produce, and that’s exactly customized to your unique needs and goals. Whether you’re seeking funding, approvals, or simply want to set your restaurant up for long-term success, our Expert Business Planning Bundle is the ultimate resource to help you achieve your vision.

Frequently Asked Questions

• How do I tailor my business plan to attract potential investors specifically?

Tailoring your business plan to appeal to potential investors involves highlighting the aspects of your business that demonstrate profitability, scalability, and a clear competitive edge. Personal information about the management team’s experience

• What information should I include in the business description section of my restaurant business plan?

The business description section should provide a comprehensive overview of your restaurant, including the concept, target market, menu offerings, and unique selling points. It should also detail the restaurant’s location, design, and how it fits into the broader market landscape. Highlight any differentiators that set your restaurant apart from competitors and outline your vision for the restaurant’s impact on the local dining scene.

• How much personal information should I share about my management team in the business plan?

Your business plan should include succinct biographies of key management team members, focusing on their relevant experience, skills, and contributions to the success of the restaurant. This section should illustrate why each member is uniquely qualified to execute the business plan, without delving into excessive personal detail. 

• Should I highlight my past success stories in the business plan?

Yes, including past a success story or two in your business plan can significantly enhance your credibility and appeal to banks, potential investors, or even landlords. Highlight how these experiences have equipped you with the skills and insights necessary to make your current restaurant venture a success. 

• What are the key elements of a company overview in a restaurant business plan?

The company overview section should summarize the essence of your restaurant, including its name, location, cuisine type, and the dining experience it offers. It should outline your mission statement, core values, and the long-term objectives of your business. 

Welcome to Businessplan.com

Currently in beta test mode.

Products available for purchase are placeholders and no orders will be processed at this time.

Let’s craft the ultimate business planning platform together.

Have questions, suggestions, or want a sneak peek at upcoming tools and resources? Connect with us on X or join “On the Right Foot” on Substack .

This site uses cookies from Google to deliver its services and to analyze traffic.

Ok, Got It.

Privacy Policy

How to Write a Restaurant Business Plan (+ Examples)

Learn how to create a restaurant business plan with the best format that outlines your concept, and financials. Get examples and templates to get started.

10 minute read

helped business professionals at:

Short answer

What is a business plan for a restaurant?

A business plan for a restaurant is a document that outlines the restaurant's concept, strategies, and financial forecasts. It serves as a roadmap for launching and growing the establishment successfully.

Don't just focus on profit margins, ensure your business plan is well-presented

In the competitive world of the restaurant industry, where low-profit margins are a well-known hurdle, there emerges a critical, yet often overlooked, factor pivotal to success: the design of the business plan.

As we enter 2024, it's becoming increasingly clear that the traditional overlook of business plan design can no longer be afforded.

This isn't just about financial projections or market analysis; it's about crafting a blueprint that encapsulates the essence of your restaurant, compellingly communicates its value, and sets a solid foundation for growth.

By focusing on the design of your business plan, you stand to gain not just the attention of potential investors but also a clearer roadmap to navigate the challenges ahead.

What makes an effective business plan?

Embarking on the restaurant business journey requires more than just a passion for food-it demands a comprehensive plan that lays out every aspect of your venture with precision and foresight.

Let's delve into what constitutes an effective restaurant business plan, ensuring it's not just another document, but a roadmap to success.

6 key components of a winning restaurant business plan:

1. Vision and concept clarity

Start with a crystal-clear articulation of your restaurant's concept. Whether it's a cozy vegan cafe or a high-end steakhouse, the essence of your establishment should leap off the page.

This clarity helps potential investors and partners instantly grasp what you're aiming to create.

Beyond the concept, delineate your restaurant's values, mission, and the unique selling points that set you apart in a crowded market.

2. Comprehensive market analysis

A deep dive into market analysis cannot be overstated. Here, you're not just identifying who your customers are but also understanding the competitive landscape.

What are the prevailing trends in the dining sector? Who are your direct and indirect competitors, and how do you plan to differentiate yourself? This section should reflect a meticulous research process, showcasing insights that guide your strategy.

3. Robust financial planning

In any successful business plan, sound financial management is key.

Essential elements include:

Realistic financial projections: Your forecasts should be realistic, and built on data-backed assumptions.

Detailed profit and loss forecasts

Cash flow predictions

Break-even analysis

Contingency planning: Preparing for unforeseen challenges is crucial.

Develop a well-thought-out contingency plan to navigate the industry's unpredictable nature.

Identify potential risks and solutions, including supplier issues, staffing shortages, and changes in consumer behavior, to ensure business resilience.

4. Operational strategies

Operational excellence underpins a restaurant's success. Detail your plans for day-to-day operations, from sourcing ingredients to managing inventory and staffing.

Highlight your commitment to quality and efficiency in every aspect of the operation, from the kitchen to customer service.

Also, outline the technology, such as restaurant POS systems you'll implement to streamline processes and enhance the dining experience.

5. Marketing and branding

In today's digital age, a savvy marketing and branding strategy is crucial.

Describe how you'll create a strong brand identity and the channels you'll use to reach your target audience.

From social media campaigns to community engagement initiatives, your plan should reflect a keen understanding of how to connect with potential customers and build a loyal following.

Discover how to create a marketing deck to align your strategy with your business objectives, target audience needs, and market trends.

6. Customer experience focus

Exceptional customer service is the lifeblood of any successful restaurant. Detail the steps you'll take to ensure every guest feels valued and satisfied.

From the ambiance and menu design to staff training programs, every element should contribute to a memorable dining experience.

Feedback mechanisms and how you'll adapt to customer preferences are also vital components of this section.

What should be included in a restaurant business plan?

Creating a restaurant business plan is a foundational step toward launching a successful dining establishment.

It outlines your vision, strategy, and the specific actions you plan to take to make your restaurant a success.

Below, we break down the essential components that should be included in your restaurant business plan, ensuring clarity, comprehensiveness, and appeal to potential investors.

8 essential sections of a restaurant business plan:

1. Executive summary

A compelling overview of the restaurant, showcasing its unique concept, mission, and strategic objectives that guide its operations.

Overview: Present a succinct snapshot of your restaurant, including its concept, mission, key goals, and ownership structure.

Purpose: Highlight what you aim to achieve with the restaurant and the appeal it has to potential investors or lenders.

2. Business description

An in-depth look at the restaurant's theme, location, and how these elements combine to create a distinctive dining experience.

Concept and theme: Describe the unique aspects of your restaurant's concept, from the cuisine and menu items to the design and ambiance.

Location analysis: Analyze the chosen location, discussing demographics, foot traffic, and how these factors make it an ideal spot for your target market.

3. Market analysis

An insightful examination of dining trends, target demographics, and customer needs to inform strategic positioning.

Trends: Examine current trends in the dining industry and how they influence your restaurant's positioning.

Target demographic: Identify your target customers, detailing their preferences, dining habits, and how your restaurant will meet their needs.

Needs and preferences: Focus on understanding and catering to what your target market seeks in a dining experience.

4. Competitive analysis

A detailed evaluation of competitors, focusing on differentiation and strategies for establishing a market edge.

Competitors: List direct and indirect competitors, analyzing their strengths, weaknesses, and how you'll differentiate your restaurant.

Differentiation: Explain the unique selling points that will set your restaurant apart in the competitive landscape.

5. Menu and product offering

Overview of menu design, ingredient sourcing, and special services that enhance the restaurant's appeal.

Menu design: Discuss the inspiration behind your menu, including how it reflects the theme and caters to your target demographic. Outline your pricing strategy and item selection.

Sourcing and suppliers: Detail your approach to sourcing high-quality ingredients, including partnerships with local suppliers and commitments to sustainability.

Special offerings: Highlight any additional services your restaurant offers, such as catering, special events, or exclusive seasonal menus, to draw in a wider audience and generate extra revenue.

6. Marketing and sales strategy

A summary of branding efforts, promotional tactics, and sales projections designed to attract and retain customers.

Branding: Detail your restaurant's brand identity, including name, logo, and how it communicates your restaurant's values and mission.

Marketing tactics: Outline the strategies you will employ to attract and retain customers, such as social media marketing, local advertising, partnerships, and loyalty programs.

Sales forecasts: Provide realistic sales forecasts, explaining the rationale behind these projections and how you plan to achieve them.

7. Operating plan

Description of daily operations, facility management, and health safety protocols to ensure smooth and compliant restaurant functionality.

Daily operations: Describe the operational flow of the restaurant, including hours of operation, staffing requirements, and customer service policies.

Facility management: Discuss the layout and design of your restaurant, kitchen equipment needs, and any other facility-related details that will ensure efficient operation.

Health and safety: Outline the health and safety measures you will implement to comply with local regulations and ensure the well-being of both employees and guests.

8. Management and organization

An outline of the restaurant's organizational structure, key personnel, and staffing strategies for operational excellence.

Ownership structure: Specify the ownership structure of the restaurant, including key stakeholders and their roles.

Team composition: Introduce the management team, chefs, and other critical staff, highlighting their experience and how it contributes to the restaurant's success.

Staffing plans: Discuss your plans for hiring staff, including numbers, positions, and the qualities you seek in employees to maintain high standards of service.

How to create a business plan for a restaurant?

Creating a standout business plan for your restaurant involves focusing on key components that blend your vision with practical strategies.

6 actionable steps to distill your restaurant business plan:

Define your concept clearly: Begin by articulating your restaurant's concept, ambiance, and what sets it apart. This clarity lays the groundwork for the entire business plan.

Conduct thorough market analysis: Dive deep into your target market and competitors. This research will guide your menu design, pricing strategy, and marketing efforts, ensuring you carve out a unique space in the marketplace.

Craft a compelling menu: Ensure your menu reflects your brand identity and appeals to your target audience, all while considering cost-effectiveness and supply chain realities. Aim for a balance between innovation and simplicity.

Develop realistic financial projections: Detail initial costs, revenue expectations, and a break-even point. Importantly, predict potential hurdles with ready contingency plans.

Outline operational strategies: Describe your daily management approach, including sourcing, staffing, and customer service. Efficient operations are crucial for a seamless experience and streamlined processes.

Implement strategic marketing: Choose the most effective ways to connect with your audience. Building a strong brand narrative and engaging actively with customers can help turn first-time visitors into regulars.

7 restaurant business plan examples for winning partners and investors

When it comes to crafting a business plan for a restaurant, the type of establishment you're planning significantly influences the structure and content of the document.

Each kind of restaurant from fast-casual and fine dining to food trucks and bistros-caters to different market segments and operational models.

Here's a look at how these differences manifest in their respective business plans:

1) Fine dining restaurant business plan

Market focus: Targets higher-income clientele seeking a premium dining experience. The plan should highlight exceptional service, high-quality ingredients, and unique culinary offerings.

Operational model: Detailed attention to the ambiance, chef expertise, and a higher staff-to-guest ratio. Wine lists and bar offerings also play a significant role.

Financial projections: Emphasizes higher check averages with a focus on profitability per guest rather than volume. The cost structure will detail higher initial investment in decor, kitchen equipment, and inventory.

Here’s an example of a fine-dining restaurant business plan:

2) Bar restaurant business plan

Market focus: Targets a diverse clientele, from young professionals to social groups, seeking a blend of dining and socializing.

Operational model: Balances innovative cuisine with an extensive beverage selection in a space designed for both eating and lounging, including live entertainment options.

Financial projections: Outlines dual revenue streams from food and drinks, emphasizing beverage sales' higher profit margins and detailing licensing, entertainment, and insurance costs.

Here’s an example of a bar restaurant pitch deck:

3) Bistro restaurant business plan

Market focus: Caters to locals and tourists seeking a casual yet refined dining experience, positioning itself as a cozy neighborhood spot.

Operational model: Highlights a selective menu that adapts seasonally, emphasizing a warm ambiance and personal service.

Financial projections: Projects moderate earnings with a strong local following, noting initial investments in location and ambiance to create a distinctive setting.

Here’s an example of a bistro restaurant pitch deck:

4) Food truck business plan

Market focus: Appeals to urban professionals, millennials, and foodies looking for unique, high-quality food options on the go.

Operational model: Mobility is key. The plan must address location strategy, permits and regulations, and adaptability to different events and seasons.

Financial projections: Lower startup costs compared to brick-and-mortar establishments but include considerations for vehicle maintenance, fuel, and parking permits.

5) Coffee restaurant business plan

Market focus: Appeals to a varied audience with a unique theme or specialty cuisine, standing out from conventional coffee shops.

Operational model: Details the influence of theme or cuisine on menu design, decor, and guest experience, aiming to make the restaurant a destination.

Financial projections: Anticipates varied financial outcomes based on concept uniqueness, with thorough market research guiding pricing and marketing strategies.

6) Italian, Mexican, Asian, etc., cuisine restaurant business plan

Market focus: Focuses on providing authentic dining experiences to both expatriates and locals interested in specific cuisines.

Operational model: Requires sourcing authentic ingredients and skilled chefs familiar with the cuisine. The business plan should address menu authenticity, culinary training, and potential partnerships for ingredient import.

Financial projections: Depending on the positioning (casual vs. fine dining), financials would reflect the cost of unique ingredients and the expected dining experience level.

Here’s an example of an Italian restaurant business plan proposal:

7) Fast food restaurant business plan

Market focus: These plans emphasize speed, efficiency, and affordability. The target market typically includes busy professionals, families looking for convenient meal options, and younger demographics.

Operational model: The business plan must detail quick service operations, including streamlined kitchen layouts, supply chain logistics for fast-moving inventory, and technology for order taking (e.g., apps, and kiosks).

Financial projections: Focus on volume sales, low to moderate check averages, and strategies for high turnover rates.

How to design a restaurant business plan?

Designing a restaurant business plan is much like crafting a compelling game pitch deck, it's all about presenting your concept in a way that's as irresistible as the dining experience you're proposing.

8 restaurant business plan design tips:

1. Embrace scrollytelling

Use narrative scrolling to take your audience through the journey of your restaurant's concept, from the inspiration behind your dishes to the ambiance you plan to create.

This dynamic presentation style keeps readers engaged, turning your business plan into an immersive experience.

Here's an example of scroll-based design:

2. Incorporate interactivity and multimedia

Go beyond static pages by embedding interactive elements like sample menu walkthroughs, virtual tours of the restaurant layout, or clips from cooking demos.

These elements not only highlight your restaurant's unique offerings but also keep potential investors or partners engaged throughout your presentation.

And here's what a static presentation looks like compared to an interactive one:

Static PowerPoint

Interactive Storydoc

3. Use data visualization

Present market research, target demographics, and financial projections through clear, compelling visuals.

Transform complex data into easy-to-understand graphs, charts, and infographics, making your business strategy both visually appealing and straightforward to grasp.

Here's an example of a presentation with dataviz elements:

4. Personalize your deck

Leverage software that allows for customization, such as incorporating the viewer's name or tailoring content to specific investor interests.

A personalized approach demonstrates meticulous attention to detail and can forge a stronger connection with your audience.

5. Use cohesive branding

Ensure your business plan reflects your restaurant's identity through consistent use of colors, fonts, and imagery that align with your branding.

This not only enhances the visual appeal of your plan but also immerses your audience in the atmosphere you aim to create.

6. Ensure mobile-responsive

Given the variety of devices stakeholders might use to view your plan, ensuring a mobile-responsive design is essential.

This ensures that your business plan is accessible and engaging, whether it's being viewed on a smartphone or a desktop computer.

7. Highlight key information

Design your business plan to draw attention to critical information.

Techniques such as strategic content placement and highlighting can guide the reader's focus, ensuring that essential points stand out without overwhelming the viewer with too much information at once.

8. Segment content in tabs

Organize your business plan into sections or tabs that cater to different aspects of your restaurant concept and business strategy.

This not only makes your plan more navigable but also allows readers to easily find the information most relevant to their interests or concerns.

Here's an example of a tabs slide:

Restaurant business plan templates

Kicking off your restaurant business plan is a daunting task, especially when you aim to capture the essence of your dining concept in a document.

Interactive restaurant business plan templates are designed to simplify this process. They provide a structured framework that incorporates interactive and multimedia elements, essential for presenting your restaurant in a vibrant and dynamic manner.

These templates not only save you precious time but also guarantee that your business plan conveys a polished and compelling story.

Snag one today!

I am a Marketing Specialist at Storydoc, I research, analyze and write on our core topics of business presentations, sales, and fundraising. I love talking to clients about their successes and failures so I can get a rounded understanding of their world.

Found this post useful?

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter.

Get notified as more awesome content goes live.

(No spam, no ads, opt-out whenever)

You've just joined an elite group of people that make the top performing 1% of sales and marketing collateral.

Make your best business plan to date

Stop losing opportunities to ineffective presentations. Your new amazing deck is one click away!

7shifts Blog Search

How to write a restaurant business plan [with sample].

By D. J. Costantino

Spend 80% less time on restaurant scheduling.

You can't start a restaurant without a plan. A restaurant business plan is one of the most (if not the most) essential elements in getting a new restaurant off the ground. There are a few reasons for this:

• A business plan is typically the first thing any lender or investor will want to look at
• Taking the time and energy to create one proves to others (and yourself) that you're serious about the venture
• You'll have a document to reference during the planning or opening of your restaurant.

Although it's an essential step in starting a restaurant , creating a business plan can be challenging for an aspiring restaurateur. But it doesn't have to be overwhelming. There are a few key sections that should be included...

Table of Contents

• What is a Restaurant Business Plan?
• Restaurant Business Plan Sample Outline
• Section 1: Executive Summary
• Section 2: Company Description
• Section 3: Market Analysis
• Section 4: Marketing Plan
• Section 5: Operations Plan
• Section 6: Financials

Section 7: Appendix

• Other Resources

What is a restaurant business plan, and why do you need one?

A restaurant business plan is a document that outlines the various aspects of your restaurant business. It can be used to secure funding from investors or keep track of your progress as you develop your business. A business plan should include information on your target market, competition, business model, marketing strategy, and financial projections.

A business plan is commonly associated with investors—it's what they will look to for a better understanding of a business, its concept , and its competitive advantage. It will also show how you plan to create a successful restaurant.

Restaurant investor Lauren Fernandez at Full Course keeps it simple: “It's to convince someone to give you money.”

“If you seek investment, it tells the story of the venture to potential investors and/or banks. For the business owner, it sets parameters as well as goals for both the pre and post-opening period. A good operator looks back on their Business Plan on a monthly or quarterly basis to gauge where they are in terms,” says Mark Moeller, president, and owner of The Recipe of Success , a national restaurant consulting firm.

That being said, a business plan doesn't have to be extensive. “Be detailed but not overly so,” says Moeller. “When a plan is too wordy, it tends to turn off the reader and can actually prevent them from finishing,” Lauren Fernandez adds that the business plan should be more akin to a sales document, not an A-to-Z tactical roadmap. At the end of the day, the main goal is to convince a lender or investor to give you money.

Restaurant Business Plan Template

Start creating you restaurant business plan with our free PDF template

The key ingredients of a great restaurant business plan

Section 1: cover page and executive summary.

This is the “elevator pitch.” An effective executive summary quickly tells the reader who you are and leaves them wanting more. Include items like:

• Your restaurant's name, concept, and cuisine—if you have a logo, use it!
• The management team
• Your market position and competitive advantage
• Your financial projections and the break-even point in sales and days

Section 2: Company description

This section gives a high-level overview of the business you're looking to start: tell investors what your restaurant is all about, who your team is, and how you're going to serve the market.

Restaurant concept

What type of restaurant are you looking to open? Here is where you'll want to give investors an overview of your business. Speak to what sets you apart from the pack, what food you'll serve, the service style (fast-food, fast casual, fine dining, etc.) you'll use, and what makes your new business special. Check out these successful restaurant ideas .

Mission Statement

Your restaurant's mission statement should boil down the essence of why you're starting this new venture in just a few words.

Some mission statements are short and to the point, like Ninety Nine's (“A Passion to Serve”). If you can't simplify your mission in just four words, there's no harm in elaborating. Here is Union Square Hospitality Group 's mission statement: At Union Square Hospitality Group, our mission is to enrich lives through the power of Enlightened Hospitality. This unique approach puts our employees first because we believe that attracting, hiring, and nurturing the right people is what sets our businesses apart. We aim to find “51%ers”, individuals who embody our Family Values of Excellence, Hospitality, Entrepreneurial Spirit, and Integrity. While much longer, it clearly speaks to the company's unique position and goals for the industry.

Management team

Tell potential investors who you already have on your team. It works in your favor to show strong connections to the restaurant industry. “Are they an island, or do they have good connections? The more people they have around them, there's something about that; there's an indicator of success that I can't put my finger on.” says Lauren Fernandez. Investors want to see that you have good people around you. If you have a great GM on board, introduce them here. An award-winning chef in the kitchen? Tell investors about them. Include a headshot, quick bio, and list of relevant experience.

Sample Menu

You don't, by any means, have to have a menu ready to go. But give an idea of some dishes or drinks with projected price points. A sample menu can go a long way in helping a potential investor imagine themselves eating at your restaurant. It also shows that you've done your research given the market, suppliers, and have an idea on menu design .

Section 3: Conduct a market analysis

This covers the customer base you're hoping to appeal to, your position in said market, and what you'll do to catch people's eyes. Describe the current restaurant market where you want to open:

Target market and demographics

Who is your target customer? Here's where you'll explain the tactics you took in conducting your market research and the results of those findings.

You'll want to highlight the most relevant statistics you found about your restaurant business. For example, if you're starting a coffee shop , you may cover that your primary research concluded that 24-36 year-olds make up 40% of your area's population. Research from other outlets suggested that coffee consumption for millennials continues to rise.

This would lead to a convincing, research-based conclusion that the coffee shop could be a realistic and profitable endeavor for the area.

Location analysis

You don't have to have a specific restaurant location or address in mind when you create a business plan. Set your focus on the city or the general neighborhood you want open in, and why you're looking at that area.

Give an overview of the market conditions in your area. Talk about things like restaurant foot traffic , day-parts, local events, and what that part of the city looks like in the future. Is there a new stadium or highrise on the way? Outline it in this section.

Your location choice should align well with the market you intend to target. For example, if you're hoping that young professionals will make up a large portion of your business, ensure your chosen location has that density of people.

Competitive analysis

Explain how your restaurant will stand out in a sea of competition. A good idea is to include SWOT analysis for your restaurant, outlining the internal strengths and weaknesses you believe your new business would have, as well as any external opportunities and threats you'd face as an entrepreneur.

Here are examples of each:

• Strengths : Combined 30+ years of restaurant experience from the leadership team.
• Weaknesses : Needed ramp-up time for staff could set our financial projections back.
• Opportunities : Our location is near several office buildings, suggesting we would have a steady flow of white-collar lunch customers and after-work dinner guests.
• Threats : An established restaurant of a similar concept is close in proximity, posing a direct threat to our potential market share.

In your SWOT analysis, you should identify how you intend to overcome the weaknesses and threats your restaurant will face to reassure investors they won't be the downfalls of your business.

Section 4: Marketing strategy

How will you reach your target audience? Sticking with the above example of a coffee shop, you may want to talk about your restaurant advertising ideas for millennials, like using TikTok marketing to promote your menu items and an app-based loyalty program.

Marketing plan and channels

Talk about what marketing channels you plan to use to get butts in seats. Detail your plans for using social media , local advertising, promotions, and how you're going to reach your target audience.

Positioning

You'll also want to take a stance on how you'd like to position your restaurant's brand and how you'd like it to be perceived. 65% of consumers feel an emotional connection to brands, so the stronger your emphasis on yours, the more likely your target market will notice and identify with it.

Grand opening plan

You can't have a restaurant without a grand opening .

“Budget at least 2-3% build cost for Grand Opening marketing. You have ONE shot at making a splash in the market, and you must get the grand opening right,” says Lauren Fernandez.“Grand opening should be a week-long celebration, not just one day. Give loyal fans a reason to come back daily. The grand opening ramp-up should begin ~90 days to open, working the market and creating excitement,”

Recommended Reading: Simple Restaurant Marketing Plan + PDF Template

Section 5: An overview of operations

Some investors want to see how all the moving pieces will mesh daily with a detailed operations plan. This section should encompass your staffing strategies, what tech you'll use, and what your restaurant layout may be.

Hiring is routinely one of the most difficult tasks in food service. Recent statistics showed that the number of people working in restaurants is declining. Add to that rising restaurant labor cost and high staff turnover . Investors want to know your hiring and retention tactics, such as retention and engagement strategies.

Back of the house

Talk about the details of the back-of-house in your restaurant, such as the commercial kitchen equipment your cooks and chefs will be wielding during their shifts and what the kitchen layout and workflow will be. If you have mock-ups - such as a kitchen floor plan - you can include them here.

Here is also a good time to discuss processes you plan to adhere to in the back of the house, such as food cost control methods and who your inventory suppliers are.

Restaurant technology

Tell investors what technology you plan on using to run your business—and not just the POS (point of sale). Restaurants have access to a bevy of software to run their business efficiently, and investors want to see that you are a savvy operator. You may want to list out:

• Team Management
• Point of Sale Systems
• Scheduling software
• Inventory management systems
• Task management tools
• Time Clocking
• Manager Log Books

Recommended Reading: Everything to Know About Restaurant Management Systems

Section 6: The financials

Don't be offended if you see investors skip straight to this section. After all, a business comes down to making money.

So before you finalize this plan, quadruple check these projections, look over your graphs and tables, and consider running them by a hired financial professional in your area.

Startup costs

Any good investor will want to know what his or her money will be going to. Disclose how much money you'll need to get this project off the ground, identify the biggest expenses, and don't be afraid to put a line item in for working capital - which is a reserve fund for your first few (likely slower) months of operation. Also, disclose if there are any planned restaurant business loans .

Sales forecast

It can be hard to create an accurate forecast without a business. But a conservative yet confident restaurant sales forecast can show investors that you're doing the research and considering the right things. You should base this forecast on a few criteria: capacity, target market, delivery/takeout options, month-over-month growth expectations, hours of operation, and menu prices.

Projected Profit & Loss Statement

Use a projected (or pro forma) P&L statement to show investors how much money you expect to have made - or lost - by the end of your first year. This should be based on your sales forecast and your projected restaurant costs (both for opening the restaurant and operating it throughout the year).

Recommended Reading: Free Restaurant Profit and Loss Statement Template

Break-Even Analysis

It's an unforgettable day for a restaurant owner when the business becomes profitable - and you can determine that point in time with a break-even analysis . Calculating break-even will project the threshold to reach in time and sales to pay back investments and startup costs, thus reaching profitability.

Show investors how you reached your break-even point with a break-even calculation. You can reach this number by dividing total fixed costs by the difference between average revenue per guest and average variable cost per guest.

Alternatively, plug those projections in this formula to produce break-even dollars:

Break Even Point = Total Fixed Costs ÷ (Avg. revenue per guest - Avg. variable cost per guest)

You can then compare this number to your sales forecast to determine a timeline for the break-even point in days to let investors know what day they'll start seeing an ROI.

Recommended Reading: 15 Restaurant Metrics to Know and How To Use Them

The appendix and its contents are all optional, but this section could contain charts, plans, graphics, imagery, or any other material investors may find useful.

Floor Plans

As mentioned earlier, the appendix is the perfect place to include any mockups of your restaurant floor plans . These plans give readers an idea of how guests and employees will be able to maneuver through and interact with each other in the space.

Additional Financial Charts

Got supporting financial documents, like projected cash flow and a projected income statement? Awesome. Place them in here to show investors you really know your numbers.

Design Mockups

If you’ve worked with a building renovator and/or interior designer, include any graphic mockups of what the space would look like. Again, this section is completely optional, but it helps investors visualize the project you’re so passionate about and proves to them that you’ve gone the extra mile in your business research and preparation.

Use this sample template to help you build your restaurant business plan. Feel free to copy and paste this entire section into a Microsoft Word file or download the outline sample in Google Docs . Then replace the explanations for each section with information about your restaurant business.

Other Resources for Your Restaurant Business Plan

No great business plan is written in a vacuum. Use whatever you have at your disposal, from industry contacts to other entrepreneurs, and read up on more best practices. Here are a few resources that you can use to help you write a successful restaurant business plan.

• Writing a Business Plan
• US Gov - Start Your Own Business
• US Chamber: 64 Grants, Loans and Programs to Benefit Your Small Business
• SCORE Business mentors: About Score

Reinventing the way restaurant teams work

Simple to set up, easy to use. Give your restaurant the team management tools they need to be successful. Start your free trial today.

Start free trial

Hi! I'm D.J., 7shifts' resident Content Writer. I come from a family of chefs and have a background in food journalism. I'm always looking for ways to help make the restaurant industry better!

• Restaurant Scheduling
• Team Communication
• Manager Log Book
• Workforce Management
• Employee Engagement
• Integrations
• Task Management
• Auto-Scheduler
• Labor Compliance
• Operations Overview
• Document Storage
• Performance Management
• Employee Onboarding
• Tip Payouts
• For Education
• Restaurant Job Board
• Resource Center
• Restaurant Guides
• Restaurant Data
• Labor Savings Calculator
• POS Integrations
• Coffee Shops
• Quick Service
• Full Service
• Help Centre
• Partner API
• 1-888-979-5877
• [email protected]

© 7shifts • Restaurant Scheduling Software.

• ZenBusiness > …
• Plan Your Business
• > How to Make a Restaurant Business Plan

How to Make a Restaurant Business Plan

Are you passionate about starting a restaurant? Discover the essential steps to write a compelling restaurant business plan and turn your culinary dreams into a thriving reality.

• Branded Cover Page
• Executive Summary
• Company Overview
• Industry Analysis
• Sample Menu
• Marketing Plan
• Operations Plan
• Financial Analysis

scroll for more

Starts at $0 + state fees and only takes 5-10 minutes

Start Your Restaurant Business!

Starting a restaurant is an exciting venture, but it requires careful planning to ensure its success. A well-crafted restaurant business plan serves as a roadmap, outlining your goals, strategies, and financial projections. In this article, we’ll guide you through the process of writing a restaurant business plan, step-by-step, making the first steps in your journey as a restaurant owner smoother.

What is a restaurant business plan?

A restaurant business plan is a document that outlines your restaurant’s concept, goals, target market, marketing strategies, operations, and financial projections. It serves as a blueprint for your business , helping you make informed decisions and attract potential investors or lenders.

A well-developed restaurant business plan not only helps you clarify your vision but also demonstrates your commitment and preparedness to stakeholders.

How to Write a Restaurant Business Plan

Every business will have a slightly different business plan, especially in the restaurant industry. However, there are a few common elements in most plans. To get started, include these elements to create an excellent business plan for a restaurant. 

Branded cover page

Your restaurant business plan should start with a professional cover page that reflects your brand identity. Include your restaurant’s name , logo , and contact information to make a strong first impression.

Executive summary

The executive summary is a concise overview of your restaurant business plan. It provides a snapshot of your concept, target market, competitive advantage, and financial expectations. Keep it engaging and captivating to grab the reader’s attention.

Company overview

In this section, provide detailed information about your restaurant. Describe your restaurant concept, location, legal structure ( such as an LLC ), and ownership. Explain your unique selling proposition (USP) and highlight what sets your restaurant apart from the competition.

Industry analysis

Conduct a thorough analysis of your target market , location, and competitors. Identify your target audience, their preferences, and demographics. Evaluate your restaurant’s location, considering factors like foot traffic, accessibility, and competition. Analyze your competitors’ strengths and weaknesses to identify opportunities for differentiation.

Sample menu

Present a sample menu that showcases your restaurant’s culinary offerings. Include a variety of dishes that reflect your concept and target audience. Describe the ingredients, cooking techniques, and pricing strategy to give potential investors or lenders an idea of your menu’s profitability.

Marketing plan

Outline your marketing strategies to attract customers and build brand awareness. Identify your target audience and develop a comprehensive marketing mix, including online and offline tactics. Include social media campaigns , your website , email marketing, promotions, partnerships, and community engagement initiatives.

Operations plan

Detail the operational aspects of your restaurant. Describe your staffing plan, including the organizational structure, key roles, and responsibilities. Explain your customer service policies and procedures, emphasizing your commitment to excellent service. Discuss your restaurant point-of-sale (POS) system and other operational systems you plan to implement. Lastly, outline your supplier relationships and inventory management strategies.

Financial analysis

Present a comprehensive financial analysis that demonstrates the viability and profitability of your restaurant. Include an investment plan, detailing the required startup costs and funding sources . Develop a projected profit and loss (P&L) statement, forecasting revenues and expenses over a specific period. Conduct a break-even analysis to determine the point at which your restaurant becomes profitable. Lastly, include an expected cash flow statement to showcase the flow of money in and out of your business.

Don’t panic if your business plan isn’t completely exact about potential prices or profits; these elements are just your best (educated) estimates. Including them, even if they change a bit after you get started, helps prove to your investors that you’ve done your homework and that you know the restaurant can succeed.

If there are other elements you want to include in your restaurant business plan, you can do so. Some businesses have an attorney help them draft this document, but that’s not a legal requirement. In fact, you can use a customizable business plan template to streamline this process. 

We can help!

At ZenBusiness, we understand the challenges of starting and running a restaurant. Our platform provides a range of services to support your journey. From seamless LLC formation to business license reports and registered agent services , we handle the administrative tasks, allowing you to focus on your restaurant’s success. Get started today and let ZenBusiness be your partner in building a thriving restaurant business.

Disclaimer: The content on this page is for information purposes only and does not constitute legal, tax, or accounting advice. If you have specific questions about any of these topics, seek the counsel of a licensed professional .

Restaurant Business Plan FAQs

What needs to be included in a restaurant business plan.

A comprehensive restaurant business plan should include key elements that outline your restaurant’s concept, target market, marketing strategies, operational plans, and financial projections. It should cover details such as your menu, pricing strategy, staffing plan, customer service policies, location analysis, competitive analysis, and investment plan. Additionally, it’s crucial to incorporate a well-researched industry analysis, highlighting market trends, customer preferences, and competitive advantages. Including these elements will provide a clear roadmap for your restaurant’s success.

How do I plan a small restaurant?

Planning a small restaurant involves several crucial steps. First, define your restaurant concept and identify your target audience. Conduct thorough market research to understand the local food industry, potential competitors, and customer preferences. Determine your budget and create a detailed financial plan that includes startup costs, equipment, inventory, and operational expenses. Develop a comprehensive marketing strategy to attract customers and build brand awareness. Lastly, create an operational plan, outlining staffing, customer service protocols, menu offerings, and supplier relationships. By carefully planning each aspect, you can set a solid foundation for your small restaurant’s success.

Is a restaurant a good business to start?

Starting a restaurant can be a rewarding and fulfilling venture for those passionate about the culinary industry. However, it’s essential to recognize the challenges that come with it. The restaurant business is highly competitive, with a significant failure rate. Success depends on various factors, including a well-defined concept, effective marketing strategies, strong financial management, excellent customer service, and a dedicated team. It’s wise to conduct thorough market research, develop a solid business plan, and use professional services like ZenBusiness to increase your chances of success.

Start a Business in Your State

Popular States for Starting a Small Business

• Start a Business in Ohio
• Start a Business in New York
• Start a Business in Texas
• Start a Business in California
• Start a Business in Florida
• Start a Business in Michigan
• Start a Business in Arkansas
• Start a Business in Alabama
• Start a Business in New Mexico
• Start a Business in Kansas
• Start a Business in Nevada
• Start a Business in South Carolina
• Start a Business in Oklahoma
• Start a Business in Mississippi
• Start a Business in Kentucky
• Start a Business in Colorado
• Start a Business in Massachusetts
• Start a Business in Idaho
• Start a Business in Wyoming
• Start a Business in Tennessee
• Start a Business in North Carolina
• Start a Business in Wisconsin
• Start a Business in South Dakota
• Start a Business in Maine
• Start a Business in Nebraska
• Start a Business in Virginia
• Start a Business in North Dakota
• Start a Business in Washington
• Start a Business in Georgia
• Start a Business in New Jersey
• Start a Business in Hawaii
• Start a Business in Pennsylvania
• Start a Business in Minnesota
• Start a Business in Delaware
• Start a Business in Maryland
• Start a Business in Iowa
• Start a Business in District of Columbia
• Start a Business in New Hampshire
• Start a Business in Rhode Island
• Start a Business in Illinois
• Start a Business in West Virginia
• Start a Business in Vermont
• Start a Business in Connecticut
• Start a Business in Montana
• Start a Business in Utah
• Start a Business in Missouri
• Start a Business in Louisiana
• Start a Business in Indiana
• Start a Business in Oregon
• Start a Business in Alaska
• Start a Business in Arizona

Ready to Start Your Restaurant?

• Formation Services
• Registered Agent
• Beneficial Ownership Filing
• Worry-Free Compliance
• Operating Agreement
• Annual Reports
• Refer friends, get $25
• Compare ZenBusiness
• Public Benefit Corporation
• Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
• Help Center
• Terms of Use
• Privacy Policy
• Partner Program
• Affiliate Program

Made with 🌮 remotely by ZenBusiness INC © 2024. All Rights Reserved.

Restaurant Business Plan Template

Written by Dave Lavinsky

If you want to start a restaurant or expand your current one, you need a business plan.

Over the past 20+ years, we have helped over 5,000 entrepreneurs and business owners create business plans to start and grow their restaurants. On this page, we will first give you some background information with regards to the importance of business planning. We will then go through a restaurant business plan step-by-step so you can create your restaurant’s business plan today.

Download our Ultimate Restaurant Business Plan Template here >

What Is a Restaurant Business Plan?

A restaurant business plan provides a snapshot of your restaurant business as it stands today, and lays out your projected growth plan for the next five years. It explains your business goals and your strategy for reaching them. It also includes market research, information about your target market, and a sample menu to support your winning restaurant business plan.

Why You Need a Business Plan for a Restaurant

If you’re looking to start a restaurant or grow the existing restaurant you need a business plan. A restaurant business plan will help you secure funding, if needed, and plan out the growth of your restaurant in order to improve your chances of success. Your restaurant business plan is a living document that should be updated annually as your company grows and changes.

Sources of Funding for Restaurants

With regards to funding, the main sources of funding for a restaurant are bank loans and angel investors. With regards to bank loans, banks will want to review your restaurant business plan and gain confidence that you will be able to repay your loan and interest.

To acquire this confidence, the loan officer will not only want to confirm that your financials are reasonable. But they will want to see a professional restaurant business plan. Such a plan will give them the confidence that you can successfully and professionally operate a business.

The second most common form of funding for a restaurant is angel investors. Angel investors are wealthy individuals who will write you a check. They will either take equity in return for their funding or, like a bank, they will give you a loan. Private equity groups are also a good source of funding for restaurant chains looking to expand further.

Finish Your Business Plan Today!

How to write a restaurant business plan.

Use the following restaurant business plan template which includes the 10 key elements for how to write a restaurant business plan that will help you start, grow, and/or secure funding for your business.

Executive Summary

Your executive summary provides an introduction to your restaurant business plan, but it is normally the last section you write because it provides a summary of each key section of your business plan.

The goal of your Executive Summary is to quickly engage the reader. Explain to them the type of restaurant business you are operating and the status; for example, are you a startup, do you have a restaurant that you would like to grow, or are you operating a chain of restaurants?

Next, provide an overview of each of the subsequent sections of your business plan. For example, give a brief overview of the restaurant industry. Discuss the type of restaurant you are operating. Detail your direct competitors. Give an overview of your target customers. Provide a snapshot of your marketing plan. Identify the key members of your team. And offer a financial analysis of your business.

Company Overview

In your company analysis, you will provide a brief description of the type of restaurant you are operating.

For example, are you writing a small restaurant business plan or a business plan for a restaurant franchise. Further, you might operate one of the following types:

• Fine Dining : characterized by the fancy decor, a dress code, and high prices
• Casual Dining : offers waiter/waitress service in a nice (but not overly fancy) atmosphere with moderate prices
• Fast Casual : characterized by quality food (close to the quality of casual dining) but no waiter/waitress service in an accessible atmosphere
• Fast Food : quick service style provided at the counter or via a drive-through. Lowest quality food and lowest prices
• Steak Restaurant : focuses on steak entrees and is usually a higher priced and fancier restaurant
• Buffet Restaurant : may or may not offer waiter/waitress service. Patrons serve themselves from buffet food selection
• Ethnic Restaurant : focuses on a specific ethnic cuisine such as Indian food, Mexican food, or Moroccan cuisine.

Within these types of restaurants, there are also ethnic food specialties such as American, Italian, Japanese, Chinese, Indian, etc.

In addition to explaining the type of restaurant you operate, the Company Analysis section of your restaurant business plan needs to provide background on the business.

Include answers to questions such as:

• When and why did you start the business?
• Your mission statement and how it connects to your restaurant’s brand.
• What milestones have you achieved to date? Milestones could include sales goals you’ve reached, new restaurant openings, etc.
• Your legal business structure. Are you incorporated as an S-Corp? An LLC? A sole proprietorship? Explain your legal structure here.

Industry Analysis

In your industry analysis, also called a Market Analysis, you need to provide a market overview and an overview of the industry.

While this may seem unnecessary, it serves multiple purposes.

First, researching the restaurant industry educates you. It helps you understand the target market in which you are operating.

Secondly, research can improve your strategy particularly if your research identifies market trends. For example, if there was a trend towards speedy restaurant services, it would be helpful to ensure your business plan calls for take-out or other quick-service options.

The third reason for market research is to prove to readers that you are an expert in your industry. By conducting the research and presenting it in your business plan, you achieve just that.

The following questions should be answered in the industry analysis section of your restaurant business plan:

• How big is the restaurant business (in dollars)?
• Is the market declining or increasing?
• Who are the key competitors in the market?
• Who are the key suppliers in the market?
• What trends are affecting the industry?
• What is the industry’s growth forecast over the next 5 – 10 years?
• What is the relevant market size? That is, how big is the potential market for your restaurant? You can extrapolate such a figure by assessing the size of the market in the entire country and then applying that figure to your local population.

Customer Analysis

The customer analysis section of your restaurant business plan must detail the customer base or target market you serve and/or expect to serve.

The following are examples of customer segments: business executives, college students, sports enthusiasts, soccer moms, techies, teens, baby boomers, etc.

As you can imagine, the customer segment(s) you choose will have a great impact on the type of restaurant you operate. Clearly, baby boomers would want a different atmosphere, pricing and sample menu options, and would respond to different marketing promotions than teens.

Try to break out your customers in terms of their demographic and psychographic profiles. With regards to diner demographics, include a discussion of the ages, genders, locations, and average income levels of the new customers you seek to serve. Because most restaurants primarily serve customers living in the same city or town, such demographic information is easy to find on government websites.

Psychographic profiles explain the wants and needs of your target customers. This should also include how your customers choose where they should eat, their dining habits, and how much they are willing to spend on a meal.

The answers to the following questions should be included in your customer analysis:

• Who is your target market?
• What are their needs and wants?
• How do they make dining decisions?
• What motivates them to choose one restaurant over another?

The more you can understand and define these needs, the better you will do in attracting and building customer loyalty.

Finish Your Restaurant Business Plan in 1 Day!

Don’t you wish there was a faster, easier way to finish your business plan?

With Growthink’s Ultimate Restaurant Business Plan Template you can finish your plan in just 8 hours or less!

Competitive Analysis

This competitive research should help you identify the direct and indirect competitors that your business faces and then focus on the latter.

Direct competitors are other restaurants.

Indirect competitors are other options that customers have to purchase from you that aren’t directly competing. This includes restaurants, supermarkets, and customers preparing dishes for themselves at home. You need to mention such competition to show you understand that not everyone frequents a restaurant each day.

With regards to direct competition, you want to detail the other restaurants with which you compete. Your greatest competitors will be restaurants located very close to your specific location, who are of the same type (e.g., fine dining, casual dining, etc.) and who offer the same cuisine (Japanese, Italian, etc.).

For each such competitor, provide an overview of the other businesses and document their strengths and weaknesses. Unless you once worked at your competitors’ businesses, it will be impossible to know everything about them. But you should be able to find out key things about them such as:

• What types of repeat customers do they serve?
• What menu items do they offer?
• What is their pricing (premium, low, etc.)?
• What are they good at?
• What are their weaknesses?

With regards to the last two questions, think about your answers from the existing customers’ perspective. And don’t hesitate to find out this information from customers by reviewing your competitors’ Yelp listings and other review pages.

The final part of this section is to document your areas of competitive advantage. For example:

• Will you provide superior food items?
• Will you provide menu items that your competitors don’t offer?
• Will you make it easier or faster for customers to acquire your meals?
• Will you provide better customer service?
• Will you offer better pricing?

Think about your unique selling points that will help you outperform your competition and document them in this section of your business plan.

    Finish Your Business Plan Today!

Marketing plan.

Traditionally, a marketing plan includes the four P’s: Product, Price, Place, and Promotion. For a restaurant business plan, your marketing plan should include the following:

Product : in the product section you should reiterate the type of restaurant that you documented in your Company Analysis. Then, detail the specific menu items you offer/will offer.

Price : Document the prices. Essentially in the product and price sub-sections of your marketing plan, you are presenting the menu items you offer and their prices.

Place : Place refers to the location of your restaurant. Perform a location analysis and mention how the location will impact your success. For example, is your restaurant located next to a heavily populated office building, or gym? Discuss how your location might provide a steady stream of customers. Also, if you operate or plan to operate food trucks, detail the locations where the trucks will operate.

Promotions : the final part of your restaurant marketing plan is the promotions section. Here you will document how you will drive customers to your location(s). The following are some promotional methods you might consider:

• Making your restaurant’s front store extra appealing to attract passing customers
• Search engine marketing and optimization
• Social media posting/advertising
• Advertising in local papers and magazines
• Reaching out to local bloggers and websites
• Local radio advertising
• Banner ads at local venues

Operations Plan

While the earlier sections of your restaurant business plan explained your goals, your operational plan describes how you will meet them.

This section of your restaurant business plan should have two key elements as follows:

• Everyday short-term processes include all of the tasks involved in running your restaurant such as serving customers, procuring supplies, keeping the restaurant clean, etc.
• Long-term goals are the milestones you hope to achieve. These could include the dates when you expect to serve your 1,000th customer, or when you hope to reach $X in sales. It could also be when you expect to hire your Xth employee or launch a new location.

Management Team

To demonstrate your restaurant’s ability to succeed as a business, a strong management team is essential. Highlight your key players’ backgrounds, emphasizing those skills and experiences that prove their ability to grow a company.

Ideally, you and/or your team members have direct experience in the restaurant business. If so, highlight this experience and expertise. But also highlight any experience that you think will help your business succeed.

If your team is lacking, consider assembling an advisory board. An advisory board would include 2 to 8 individuals who would act like mentors to your business. They would help answer questions and provide strategic guidance. If needed, look for advisory board members with experience operating restaurants and/or successfully running small businesses.

Financial Plan

Your financial plan should include your 5-year financial statement broken out both monthly or quarterly for the first year and then annually. Your financial statements include your income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statements.

Pro-Forma Profit & Loss Statement / Income Statement

An income statement is more commonly called a Profit and Loss statement or P&L. It shows how much revenue you expect to earn or have earned, and then subtracts your costs to show your actual or projected profit.

In developing your income statement, you need to devise assumptions. For example, will you serve 100 customers per day or 200? And will sales grow by 2% or 10% per year? As you can imagine, your choice of assumptions will greatly impact the financial forecasts for your business. As much as possible, conduct research to try to root your assumptions in reality.

Pro-Forma Balance Sheets

While balance sheets include much information, to simplify them to the key items you need to know about, balance sheets show your assets and liabilities.

For instance, if you spend $250,000 on building out your restaurant, that will not give you immediate profits. Rather it is an asset that will hopefully help you generate profits for years to come. Likewise, if a bank writes you a check for $100.000, you don’t need to pay it back immediately. Rather, that is a liability you will pay back over time.

Pro-Forma Cash Flow Statement

Your cash flow statement will help determine how much money you need to start or grow your business and make sure you never run out of money. What most entrepreneurs and business owners don’t realize is that you can turn a profit but run out of money and go bankrupt.

For example, let’s say a company approached you with a massive $100,000 catering contract, that would cost you $50,000 to fulfill. Well, in most cases, you would have to pay that $50,000 now for ingredients, supplies, equipment rentals, employee salaries, etc. But let’s say the company didn’t pay you for 180 days. During that 180-day period, you could run out of money.

In developing your Income Statement and Balance Sheets be sure to include several of the key costs needed in starting or growing a restaurant:

• Location build-out including design fees, construction, etc.
• Cost of equipment like stoves, refrigerators, blenders
• Cost of ingredients and maintaining an adequate amount of supplies
• Payroll or salaries paid to staff
• Business insurance
• Taxes and permits
• Legal expenses

Attach your full financial projections, detailed cost analysis and/or break-even analysis in the appendix of your business plan along with any supporting documents that make your plan more compelling. For example, you might include your store design blueprint, location lease, or initial menu design.

Taking the time to write your own restaurant business plan for your business is a worthwhile endeavor. It will help you communicate your ideas and provide potential investors with the information they need to make an informed decision about investing in your restaurant.

A well-crafted business plan will also give you a road map for growing your business and achieving your long-term goals. So, while it may take some time to put together, it will be well worth the effort in the end.

If you follow the restaurant business plan template above, by the time you are done, you will truly be an expert. You will really understand the restaurant business, your competition, and your existing customers. You will have developed a marketing plan and will really understand what it takes to launch and grow a successful restaurant concept.

Want more tips? Check out our related articles and downloads:

• How to Start a Restaurant
• Restaurant Startup Costs: How Much Does It Cost To Start a Restaurant?
• How To Write a Restaurant Marketing Plan + Template & Examples
• How To Get Funding To Start and/or Grow Your Restaurant
• Free Restaurant Business Plan Template

Don’t you wish there was a faster, easier way to finish your Restaurant business plan?

OR, Let Us Develop Your Plan For You

Since 1999, Growthink has developed business plans for thousands of companies who have gone on to achieve tremendous success.   Click here to see how Growthink’s business plan professional services can help you create a winning business.

Other Helpful Business Plan Articles & Templates

How to Write a Restaurant Business Plan: Free Template & Tips

By Dana Krook

If you want to open a restaurant, the first thing you need to do is create a restaurant business plan. This essential document serves as a blueprint for your vision and details all the different steps you’ll need to take in order to turn your business dreams into reality. 

However, if you’ve never written a business plan before, the process can seem a little intimidating. So to help you get started, we’ve put together a complete guide to writing a business plan for your restaurant. In this guide, we’ll cover:

• What is a business plan?
• How and when to write a restaurant business plan
• The 7 sections of every business plan
• A free restaurant business plan template

What is a Restaurant Business Plan?

A restaurant business plan is a written document that outlines your business goals and how you will go about achieving those objectives. Put simply, a business plan acts as a written roadmap for a new restaurant from a financial, operational, and marketing perspective. Additionally, a restaurant business plan is also an important document for attracting outside financial investments – especially if you do not have an existing track record.

Though the length of a business plan varies from business to business, this type of document usually spans 15 to 20 pages. All business plans also tend to have the same basic elements, including an executive summary, a detailed description of the business, its services, and its products, a market analysis, an operations plan, and a financial analysis.

Why You Need a Business Plan

As mentioned above, a restaurant’s business plan is a very important document, because it serves as a step-by-step guide for bringing your new business to life. By putting all the necessary information in your business plan, you’ll be able to clearly navigate each stage of the journey – from construction to daily operations.

Your business plan is also essential for raising money from investors. Opening a restaurant is expensive and often you’ll need capital from outside investors. Your business plan can help to convince investors to provide you with funding by showing them that you have a well-throughout plan for success and a sound financial strategy.

Download this customizable restaurant business plan template to create a professional business plan for your new venture.

How to Write a Restaurant Business Plan: The 7 Sections Your Business Plan Template Should Include

While no two business plans are alike, they all include a few common elements. Below, we’ll explain the process of writing a restaurant’s business plan, including the seven key sections to include and what to write in each. You can also follow along and start filling out your own business plan – digitally or on paper – by downloading our restaurant business plan template .

1. Executive Summary

Look at any restaurant business plan example and you’ll see that it starts with an executive summary. The executive summary for a restaurant business plan introduces your new business and serves as a summary for your vision. The goal of this section is to provide an overview of what will be discussed in your business plan and to entice readers (likely investors) to want to know more.

In your executive summary, be sure to touch on your restaurant mission statement , your proposed concept, and how you’ll execute your business plan. You should also list any business partners and, if you’re targeting investors, detail the funding requirements.

And while this section is important, remember to keep it concise. Aim for 600 words max to encourage your reader to dive further into your business plan.

2. Business Description 

A business description section should follow your executive summary. The purpose of this section is to provide your reader with a high-level overview of your restaurant idea and to answer key questions that investors may have, such as the business concept, service model, and ownership structure.

Describe your restaurant concept in detail by providing information on the following:

• Business structure: Is your restaurant a sole proprietorship, partnership, or something else?
• Concept: Define your concept and what makes it unique compared to other restaurants. Be clear on the defining theme for your restaurant and what type of cuisine you will serve. Do you have any restaurant names in mind? Include them here.
• Service Model: Explain what level of service you will offer – whether that’s limited service, full service, or something in between.
• Menu: Include a small sample menu in your business plan and explain the inspiration behind the menu. 
• Design and Layout: Provide an overview of your restaurant interior design and layout. Touch on key elements such as plateware, lighting, uniforms, and more.
• Management and Ownership: Provide more information about yourself and the management team you’ve assembled for your new restaurant, highlighting any relevant experience that will aid in your success. 

Keep in mind that this section can easily come across as a bit dry and mundane – especially for investors who have read dozens of business plans. Think about how you can make your business idea stand out with passionate language and unique details.

3. Target Market and Market Analysis

Whether you’re buying or leasing , this section is where you describe the specific location of your new restaurant and the current market conditions. In addition to general information about your target market, you also want to explain your unique positioning in the market, your ideal customer profile, and how you’ll make your restaurant stand out.

In this section, you’ll clearly define:

• Location: Explain the location (or prospective location) of your new restaurant and why you chose that specific area.
• Target Audience: Include both demographics and psychographics.
• Market Need: Describe the market need your restaurant will satisfy. Maybe you’re a coffee shop appealing to millennials who crave immersive coffee experiences.
• Positioning and Strategy: Descibe how you’ll meet your market need. Using the coffee shop example, you may choose to provide guided tours of your roastery or host workshops on making coffee.
• Competition and Opportunities: This includes both direct and indirect competition. Research the market by visiting your competition, seeing how they do things, and pinpointing what you can do better. You can then lay all this information out for investors by sketching out a SWOT analysis .
• Competitive Advantage: List your competitive advantage. Start by looking at your competition and see where you fit in.
• Market Trends: Find statistics to prove there’s demand for your concept. For example, a simple Google search for coffee demand in the U.S. yields ample results.

4. Marketing Plan

Your marketing plan section details the restaurant marketing ideas , strategies, and tactics you’ll employ to get the word out about your restaurant. This section should go into detail about how you plan to market your restaurant, and after you open.

For instance, you might want to hire a PR team to drum up excitement ahead of your grand opening. And then after you open, you might want to leverage local food influencers to grow your social media presence.

5. Operations Plan

Your operations section is where you get into the nitty gritty of how your restaurant will operate once you’re up and running.

In this section, include details about:

• Your Team: Who will be working at your restaurant? If you haven’t filled any positions yet, simply list the roles that need filling.
• Supplier Relationships: List your suppliers across various categories like food, alcohol, cleaning services, and more.
• Technology: What’s the best restaurant POS system for your venue? Will you be using third-party food delivery apps or a direct online ordering system ?
• Insurance: Ensure you follow mandatory restaurant insurance requirements and research any other special coverage you may need.
• Licensing: Licenses you’ll probably require include a business license, liquor license , music license, sign permit, and food handler’s permit.

6. Financial Analysis and Growth Plan

Your financial analysis is one of the last sections of your business plan, but it’s also one of the most important sections. In fact, many investors may skip straight to this section to determine how viable your idea is and whether your business is an attractive investment (or not). 

Make sure you complete a financial forecast that includes the following: 

• Pre-opening or startup costs (you may need to get some restaurant startup quotes )
• Financing, loans, and other funding
• An investment plan and budget (using a restaurant budget template may be helpful)
• A sales forecast
• A projected profit and loss (P&L) statement
• A break-even analysis 
• Expenses and expected cash flow

7. Appendix

Adding an appendix section is optional, but highly recommended. This section is a great place to include charts, plans, graphics, pictures, a detailed budget, or any other material investors may find useful.

In your appendix, you may want to include:

• A sample menu
• Blueprints or pictures of your restaurant floor plan
• Additional financial charts and figures
• Design mockups

Ready to get started? Grab the template!

9 Tips for Writing a Great Plan

Now that you understand what key elements to include in your restaurant’s business plan, let’s look at 9 tips for writing yours.

1. Use a Business Plan Template

Before writers start writing, they usually have a basic outline that acts as a template – a starting point – for their idea. By following the same approach when writing your business plan, the entire process will be much smoother. And lucky for you, we have a free restaurant business plan template available to help you get started.

2. Create a Detailed Outline

Using our template, create an even more detailed outline. Make your way through all the sections of your business plan and jot down key points under each section.

3. Embrace the “Good Enough” Mindset

As you move through the sections of your plan, you may get stuck and have nothing to say. If this happens, make a note to come back to it later and move on. You can always include more detail after you’ve done more research.  

4. Research to Find Statistics and Inspiration

You will need to research to find statistics to back up your arguments, with specific sections requiring more research than others (i.e. the “Market Analysis” section). You may even want to find a sample restaurant business plan that will spark your creativity and give you ideas on how to better present yours.

5. View Your Plan as a Work in Progress

Writing a business plan takes time as you get a grip on the details and fine-tune your message. The key is to embrace this process and view your business plan as an ever-evolving document you can add to over time. 

Ready to kickstart your restaurant business plans?

6. know who your audience is.

Who are you writing for? Investors? Just you and your staff? Your audience will dictate the contents of your plan, the level of detail, and what language you’ll use. 

If you’re writing for investors, your plan will need to be more detailed than if you’re writing for internal stakeholders. And because investors may have limited knowledge of restaurant terminology, avoid industry jargon and instead use plain English. It’s helpful to look at another restaurant business plan example to see how these types of documents are written.

7. Use Visuals, Charts, and Tables

Use images, graphics, tables, and charts to explain complex ideas, add color to your document – both literally and figuratively – and present specific information. 

8. Summarize Each Part of Your Business Plan

After you’ve completed a section of the plan, write a short summary that highlights the critical details and key takeaways of that section.

9. Write Your Executive Summary Last

An executive summary for a restaurant business plan summarizes your entire document so you should try to write it last – after you’ve covered all the details.

The Importance of Business Plans in the Restaurant Industry

Writing a restaurant business plan is essential – even if you already own a restaurant. A business plan acts as a blueprint you can follow, reduces stress, and boosts investor confidence. And when you start with a restaurant business plan template , the process moves that much faster.

Dana is the former Content Marketing Manager at TouchBistro, sharing tips for and stories of restaurateurs turning their passion into success. She loves homemade hot sauce, deep fried pickles and finding excuses to consume real maple syrup.

Download our free inventory template

Sign up for our free weekly touchbistro newsletter.

Your Complete Guide to Restaurant Reservations

More Articles

Join over 35,000 subscribed restaurateurs and unlock

• Free industry reports, checklists, templates, guides, and more
• The latest restaurant trends delivered straight to your inbox
• Tips for running a successful restaurant

How to Write a Restaurant Business Plan: A Step-by-Step Guide

Discover how to craft a winning restaurant business plan that charts a path toward success.

Whether you're seeking investment, planning for growth, or simply looking to establish a clear operational blueprint, a comprehensive restaurant business plan is indispensable. A meticulously prepared restaurant business plan serves multiple functions: attracting investors, forecasting profits, and strategizing for sustainable growth. 

In today's food service sector, a detailed plan will help you navigate the complexities of the market confidently. This guide will walk you through creating a robust restaurant business plan and help define your path to success. 

How to develop a restaurant business plan

When creating a restaurant business plan, the goal is to outline profit generation strategies. In addition to the financial aspects, a well-structured business plan should encompass factors like branding, staffing, and marketing, so before you start drafting, take a moment to take these initial preparatory steps. 

Define your restaurant concept and priorities

During the startup phase, establish your priorities. If you're launching a fast food eatery, you might focus on quick service, a wide menu selection, and competitive prices — but if it's a food truck , you might prioritize mobility and affordability. If you're establishing a high-end restaurant, your priorities likely are exceptional customer care, a sophisticated ambiance, and top-quality ingredients. Here's the bottom line: Can you explain your restaurant idea quickly and concisely? What about your restaurant idea is unique and gets you excited? Develop a clear vision of your restaurant and list what's most important to you — your business strategy will reflect your concept. 

Review sample restaurant business plans 

Learning from others is key, so get networking or researching any connections in the industry so you can review established restaurant business plans. Look at how other plans showcase unique selling points, and undertake market analysis to identify areas for cost optimization and margin improvement. Ultimately, your plan should reflect your distinct vision, but understanding how others built out their vision and the structure they adhered to is valuable in helping you develop your restaurant business plan. 

Calculate startup and ongoing costs

Assess your financial needs as you plan your restaurant budget and consider the range of startup costs. Are you taking over an existing space or are you renovating and building from scratch? Calculate all associated expenses such as operations, leasing, renovations, equipment, initial inventory, and licensing fees — you'll want to consider every variable cost line by line, which varies widely based on your business model.

Estimate your daily operational costs, such as rent and utilities. How much will ingredients cost to make your menu and what does your payroll look like? What roles do you need to hire to get your operation running? Then think about your marketing budget — how much will it cost to design the website, the take-out menu, and additional promotional materials? These questions should help inform your financial plan, budget, and overall cost of launching and running your restaurant effectively.

Key sections of a restaurant business plan

For a successful restaurant concept, aim for a culinary experience that fills a gap for your target customers, even if they still need to be made aware of it. While drawing inspiration from various sources, remember that a well-crafted restaurant business plan typically includes elements like an executive summary, company overview, industry analysis, operations plan, marketing plan, financial analysis, and restaurant menu.

1. Executive summary

An executive summary describes the big picture for your restaurant. Offer a compelling overview of your restaurant concept. Introduce yourself, your vision, and the market you're addressing. Include items like your mission statement , core values, and key differentiators. Remember, this is the first thing potential investors will read. It needs to grab their attention, convince them that there is a strong potential for success, and get them excited about what you bring to the table.

2. Company overview

You've already provided an overview of your restaurant concept, so now dive into the details of your restaurant, including its legal structure. Here, you can describe your restaurant concept in more detail, including cuisine, service style, operating hours, and ambiance. What makes your restaurant different? Include the contacts, owner details, location, and other relevant information about the restaurant you're opening. 

3. Industry analysis

A thorough analysis demonstrates your understanding of the broader restaurant market, so identify current trends affecting the sector and analyze your local competitors and nearby businesses. Are you close enough to office buildings to expect daily lunch rushes? Are you in a shopping center where there's great foot traffic? Is there a movie theater nearby with more opportunities for dinner service? 

Describe the neighborhood's economy, demographic makeup, and projected growth. Are there other opportunities and challenges you anticipate and is there any additional information potential partners or investors find helpful? This section allows you to be specific while showcasing your initiative to prove what gaps your restaurant fills.

4. Operations plan

An operations plan details the day-to-day running of your restaurant, from the organizational structure and kitchen workflow to customer service protocols and employee play. Outline your restaurant's processes, plans, and procedures that will ensure efficiency and quality, making sure to include information on suppliers and equipment needs. Will you be bringing in a notable chef, mixologist, or sommelier? What restaurant technology will you invest in and will you pursue an exclusive partnership with a third-party delivery service ?

A majority of merchants say that without DoorDash, their overall revenue (58%), new customer growth (52%) and revenue growth (51%) would have been lower.

5. Marketing plan

Your marketing plan should articulate how to attract and retain customers through customer awareness and acquisition initiatives, advertising, public relations, community engagement, and events. Discuss branding, promotional tactics, and community engagement strategies . Detail your plans for digital marketing, traditional advertising, and any unique campaigns or events designed to build buzz and loyalty and keep your patrons active.

Will your team take on your marketing initiative, or will you hire a social media consultant or PR agency to help you with launch and post-launch activity? If you're using an external vendor, it's important to include their client list, successful case studies, and a brief write-up of the services they'll provide for you. How you communicate with your patrons outside the walls of your restaurant will inform your marketing strategy .

6. Financial analysis

Arguably the most scrutinized section, the financial analysis provides a detailed forecast of your revenue, costs, and profitability. When do you think your restaurant will break even? Calculate and project when you feel your restaurant's monthly expenses become less than the income it'll generate — remember, these timelines can take anywhere from six months to years. 

When you're pre-launch, your forecasts are essentially educated guesses, so anchor these guesses in thorough market research, actual expenses, and expected earnings. Use realistic assumptions to build credibility with potential investors to include a five-year outlook covering estimated revenue and capital expenditure budgets.

Once your business is operational, provide concrete financial data like cash flow and profit and loss statement , especially spanning the past five years. Utilize visually engaging charts and graphs to showcase financial achievements, enabling investors to quickly assess your company's financial well-being.

7. Restaurant menu 

Include a sample menu or a detailed description of your offerings, as this section will help readers visualize the dining experience and understand how your menu aligns with your restaurant concept. Highlight signature dishes or unique ingredients that make your menu stand out from your competitors. Consider this section an extension of your restaurant branding, so work closely with your chef to create an eye-catching menu with evocative menu descriptions that follow strong design principles. 

Get professional feedback on your restaurant business plan, review, and refine

Once your draft is complete, seek feedback from experienced restaurateurs, mentors, or business advisors ​​— their insights can help refine your plan, making it more compelling and effective. Be open to constructive criticism and use it to polish your plan before presenting it to potential investors. Remember that incorporating diverse perspectives can lead to a more robust and successful business strategy in the long run.

Download a free sample restaurant business plan

Breaking down the process of creating a restaurant business plan into segments can make the task more manageable, as you can develop a comprehensive and robust plan by addressing each part individually. Crafting a business plan may appear challenging, but it demonstrates to potential investors that you have a well-thought-out strategy for success. 

Ready to create your own winning restaurant business plan? Download the free Restaurant Business Plan template to get started.

Content Marketing, DoorDash

Subscribe for insights to help you run a great business, delivered weekly to your inbox.

Recent Posts

How to Start a Taproom

A Biochemist's Journey to Opening a Restaurant and Wine Bar

The 18 Most Popular Types of Restaurants, From Fine Dining to Food Trucks

More From Forbes

Writing a restaurant business plan.

• Share to Facebook
• Share to Twitter
• Share to Linkedin

Introduction

If you're considering opening a restaurant, your first step should be writing a business plan. A well-written business plan can help you raise money, manage your restaurant and succeed. Here's what you need to know about writing one:

Executive Summary

An executive summary is a short but powerful document that can help you to get your point across quickly and effectively. Although it is usually the first section of a business plan, it should be the last piece written. It should be one page at maximum and clearly describe your business plan's critical points in a way that makes sense to anyone who reads it. The purpose of an executive summary is to convince potential investors or lenders that they will profit from investing in your restaurant idea, so avoid unimportant details or lengthy descriptions of how great your food tastes.

An excellent way to write an executive summary is by starting with an introduction paragraph that summarizes what the rest of your plan contains—this helps readers understand why they should continue reading further into the document. Then go into discussing why this particular project is worthwhile; why people need it. How will it benefit them? Next comes some background information about yourself: include any relevant experience or education related to running this business. Finally, end with future goals: where do you see yourself after opening the shop?

Here are some items to include in your restaurant business plan:

Best Travel Insurance Companies

Best covid-19 travel insurance plans, concept validation and business model testing.

Before you launch your business, it's important to validate your concept and test the viability of your business model. You can do this by conducting market research, talking with potential customers, and interviewing industry experts with similar business experiences. You can also test the viability of your plan by completing an "experience economy" analysis. That is, looking at ways people enjoy spending money on experiences rather than goods (such as dining out). For example, if people value experiences over material goods, opening a restaurant may be a good idea!

Labor Costs and Staffing Plan

Labor costs, including direct and indirect labor, are essential to your labor budget. Direct costs refer to wages paid directly to employees, while indirect expenses include benefits like healthcare coverage and payroll taxes. To calculate these figures, you'll need to estimate the number of full-time equivalents (FTE) positions you'll need and their average salaries. This calculation can be tricky because each restaurant has its unique staffing plan based on its size, location, cuisine type, and reputation among customers, not to mention any other factors that might affect staffing decisions (e.g., whether it's open 24/7).

The first step is deciding whether or not you want full-time staff or part-time workers who work only during peak times such as lunchtime rush hour or Friday night dinners out with friends at restaurants nearby yours. As tempting as it may seem, wait to write anything down until after reading through the following sections because several factors are explicitly related to determining how many people we'll need overall.

You want your menu to be focused and simple. Try to add only a few items, as too many menu items may confuse customers, making it difficult for them to choose what they want.

If there are any "signature" items on your menu, include them first when listing off your offerings so that people know what kind of food you serve before even stepping inside the restaurant. Also, incorporating local ingredients into these specialties will help build community spirit around supporting local businesses.

Site selection is a critical factor in your success. After conducting a comprehensive market study, the site selection is based on the data you discover to determine if your customers are in and frequent that area. David Simmonds, Founder and CEO of ResolutRE , a Commercial Real Estate firm in Austin, Texas, states: "More than ever, entrepreneurs opening a restaurant need to analyze what their own customers look like on paper (demographics, psychographics, etc.), so then when they are examining a market, they can find the highest concentration of their customers within that market. From that data, they are able to determine the number of restaurants that the market could support, and from there, create the blueprint for their expansion."

Your plan should describe your ideal location . Your chosen location must be close to your target market and similar businesses, such as restaurants or cafes. The site should also have high foot traffic and be accessible by car, bike, and public transportation. Simmonds goes on to say: "Analytics reinforces or disputes instincts. It is a necessary part of the expansion process, whether the restauranteur has 1 unit or 37.

Marketing Strategy

When developing your business plan, think about the marketing strategy you will use. Your plan should consider and explain the following marketing tactics:

• Advertising: You can use print or online ads on social media sites like Facebook and Instagram. Also, consider running commercials on local television stations.
• Public relations: This can include writing articles about your restaurant in local newspapers or magazines, hosting events at your restaurant (such as wine tastings), speaking at community events like Chamber of Commerce meetings with other business owners in the area, participating in charity events related to foodservice industries like Feeding America—the possibilities are endless! The idea is to get people talking about what makes YOU unique so they think of YOU first when ready for their next dine-out experience!
• Social media: Let's face it—most millennials don't even pick up the phone anymore; they prefer texting over talking face-to-face because it feels intimate somehow, and guess what? By interacting directly with customers through social media platforms like Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp (which allows users from all over the world access 24 hours per day, seven days per week), we can offer immediate customer service support during high-demand times such as weekend brunch hours without having employees sitting idle during slow periods throughout weekdays when traffic drops off significantly due the lack of demand generated elsewhere.

Profit and Return on Investment Analysis

• Profit is the difference between your sales revenue and your costs. To calculate it, you need to know the following:
• Sales revenue (how much money you expect to make from selling food)
• Cost of goods sold (the cost of ingredients and supplies)
• Other operating expenses (including labor, rent, and utilities)

The reader of your business plan should be able to find these numbers in your budgeting worksheet and financial projections spreadsheet.

Financial Plan

The financial plan is the most critical part of your business plan. It should clearly show how much money you need to start, run and grow your restaurant.

You will need to show a projected profit and loss statement. The projected profit and loss statement (P&L) shows how much revenue comes in, what expenses are incurred, and what profits are made over time. In addition, the P&L shows all revenue sources, including but not limited to sales of food/alcoholic beverages and income from private parties. It must also project all costs associated with operating the restaurant, such as Cost of Goods (raw materials) and salaries for employees - these include both front-of-house roles such as waiters or bartenders, as well as back-of-house roles like chefs who prepare food during off hours so it can be served fresh upon opening each day - cleaning supplies needed throughout each week, etc., depreciation costs associated with long term assets such as ovens that wear down over time and waste of unused food product.

Multi-Year Projections of Revenue and Costs

Accurate projections are the key to a successful business plan. They help you to understand how much money you will make and how much you will need to make it happen. Projections also help with understanding what your costs will be.

For example, if I were starting a restaurant today and wanted my business plan projections for opening day and going out one, three, and five years.

Then I would look at similar restaurants that serve similar foods, noting their prices, portion sizes, and any specialties they offer, such as breakfast all day or lunch specials every Friday during football season. This research of other restaurants will give you a basis for your projections. Include the documentation of this research in the narrative of the plan.

A Business Plan Is Your Road Map To Success.

A business plan can help you raise money by demonstrating that you have a viable idea for a restaurant. In addition, investors want to see that others are interested in investing in your vision, so they'll be more likely to give you money if they see other investors involved with it as well. An excellent example is when an investor wants to invest but only if another investor does first; this way, both parties feel comfortable investing because they know someone else believes in the project enough to put their own money into it too!

A well-written business plan helps manage restaurants by giving owners information about how much money will be coming in over time, so there aren't any surprises when bills come due every month - which could lead businesses into trouble if left unchecked."

This article has given some insights into how to write a business plan for opening a restaurant. Do your research and learn other aspects of good business plan writing. I know that it can be a lot of work, but I also know that the payoff is worth it. Not only will you have a better understanding of what it takes to open up shop and run it successfully but also potential investors will be more likely to fund your project if they see that you've done your research. And remember: don't be afraid to ask other restaurant owners for help or advice; many of them have been where you are now.

• Editorial Standards
• Reprints & Permissions

• Cloud Kitchen
• Restro Gyaan
• Foodpreneurs

How To Write A Restaurant Business Plan in 2023- All You Need To Know

The first step to opening your restaurant business is to have a clear, unambiguous idea of your restaurant; what is it that you plan to create and sell. A Restaurant Business Plan acts as a guideline, a roadmap for the future development of your restaurant business. It is the blueprint for operating your restaurant.  What you must remember while writing a restaurant business plan is that it is for your use and clarity of thought. It is more of a guide you develop for yourself to understand how you will be running your restaurant business. From a business plan, a business proposal is generated which is to be shared with outside parties like investors and bank authorities.

Even though it is mostly for internal use, you need to know how to write the restaurant business plan properly. It needs to be structured in an easy, understandable, logical, and feasible manner. Your restaurant plan should also be sustainable in the long run. Moreover, it’s required so that you can maintain what your restaurant is about, where you plan to take it and how you plan to achieve those goals. You should consider all the opportunities and pitfalls of your restaurant business well while writing a business plan for your restaurant. But before you put your dreams of opening a restaurant on paper, read this detailed piece on How To Open A Restaurant Business . This article will be a comprehensive guide on ‘How To Write A Restaurant Business Plan’.

What Your Restaurant Business Plan Should Include

While writing a restaurant business plan, you must include:-

• Summary of the Restaurant Business Plan
• Business Overview
• Industry Analysis
• SWOT Analysis
• Operations Plan
• Financial Analysis
• Marketing Plan

A tip to effectively write a restaurant business plan is to not write it as a finished document but in structured parts, for example, even though the ‘Summary’ of your business will be the first thing in your plan, it is better to write it at the end as that way you will have a more structured idea of what all is in the plan and what all you need to include in the summary. Similarly, it is better to conduct and write regarding your ‘SWOT Analysis’ before the ‘Industry Analysis’ as only after knowing what your strengths and weaknesses are can you place yourself in the Industry and determine your competitors.

Here is a downloadable business plan template that would help you create a winning business plan using the points mentioned below.

1. Summary of the Restaurant Business

Your restaurant plan should begin with an overview of the summary of your restaurant concept that acts as an introduction to your business. This is the gateway to your restaurant business plan and so it is essential to get it just right, but at the same time, you must keep it short and precise.

It should include things such as your mission statement, a review of your restaurant’s legal structure and ownership, a brief history of the restaurant if it’s an existing restaurant, and future plans of your restaurant business.  Your restaurant plan should be an overview of your business comprising of all-around strategies.

2. Business Overview

The next step in the creation of a restaurant business plan is describing your restaurant concept. You should be able to clearly define what would be the USP of your restaurant and why it will work.  You should provide the reason behind the concept of your restaurant,  why the concept will be successful, your plan to make it a reality, its cost, and the anticipated return on investment.  While deciding upon the concept, you should be able to answer:

• What makes your concept unique or needed
• Why your concept will work
• What are you aiming at?
• Who are you going to cater to?
• Who will be your target clientele?
• What service/product you will provide to your target clientele?

If you haven’t decided already, this article will help you choose the right concept for your upcoming restaurant.

The Business Overview of the Restaurant Plan comprises of three aspects-

a) The Layout of the Restaurant/ Type of Service

b) Sample Menu

C) management team.

The next process of writing the restaurant business plan would be deciding the cuisine and the menu. By this time you should be clear about your pricing as you would have already decided your clientele.

a) The Layout of the Restaurant / Type of Service

You need to mention the format and the design of your restaurant in the Restaurant Business Plan. The design and layout of the restaurant should be in sync with the format of the restaurant. For example, the interior design of a fine-dine restaurant would be different from that of a fast-food restaurant. Also, include the cutlery, kitchen equipment, staff uniform that would complement the brand image of the restaurant in the business plan.

A good descriptive summary of the style of the service, as well as the promptness, is necessary to communicate the conceptual image of the restaurant properly. Will your restaurant be self-service or would you provide wait staff, how qualified will that staff be, do you plan to have sections in your restaurant, all of these must be considered and mentioned in this section.

Needless to say, your menu is the heart of your restaurant plan . It is generally accepted by restaurant entrepreneurs that if you serve excellent food, your restaurant will be able to survive the competition. Thus what you plan to offer is an integral part of the restaurant business plan.

Your sample menu should be a simple list of items with half and full prices . Even if you plan to add on to the menu later, do not include the dishes you will not immediately serve at your restaurant. This is so because most of the time, new dishes are not simply added to the restaurant menu, instead, the menu is optimized. This means that low-performing dishes are removed and newer, better dishes are added in their place. This way innovation is ensured while keeping costs low and menu design in place.

Apart from that, your menu should be guided by the availability of ingredients. Instead of going for a fancy and difficult menu with 10 dishes of paneer or chicken, it is always favorable to go for 4 dishes of veg and 2 dishes of non-veg, for example.  It is recommended that  while making a sample menu design, don’t go for dishes that require hard to procure ingredients or complicated techniques to prepare it. Your menu should be balanced, between cold or hot and heavy and light dishes. The reason is that generally, the chefs who apply at restaurants are less skilled and mostly unemployed.  So in a crisis when the chef leaves your restaurant, you can hire another chef with lesser difficulty.

But your head chef should be skilled and creative enough to be able to take the risk of experimenting with texture and taste. However, make sure that you don’t miss out on popular options demanded by your target audience. You could also look up some of the small restaurant business plan samples to make sure you don’t miss out on anything.

Your Restaurant Plan should also include the details of your Management Team. This list would include the Owner, General Manager, and Head Chef. It will also include the responsibilities assigned to each member for clarity.

3. Industry Analysis

You should be able to identify your target customers, their spending behavior, their purchasing power, and other demographics. You can serve them better once you know what they expect and how much they are willing to shell out. The Industry Analysis primarily consists of Location Analysis, Target Audience Analysis, and Competition Analysis. Here we have explained everything in short, for a detailed guide on how to do an industry analysis for your restaurant business plan, click  here. 

You must also look at some of the small restaurant business plan samples on the net. 

a) Location Analysis

Finding the ideal location for your restaurant is one of the biggest challenges that you will face. There should be a clear connection between the location of your restaurant, the format of your restaurant, and your target audience.

The location analysis for your restaurant business plan should describe the market conditions that exist in the location (or general area) you have selected. If your restaurant is in a mall, it is likely to attract families.  If the location you choose is surrounded by colleges, hostels, and PGs, mainly teenagers will be the ones visiting your restaurant. Whichever location you choose, it should have the following features:

• The location of your restaurant should be easily accessible .
• It would be better if your restaurant has a parking area .
• Your location should be Google-map-friendly .
• Information gathered and displayed here should include demographic statistics, a description of local industry and the competition around you. 
• At the same time, figure out how you plan to manage the supplies in the future with minimum shipping and delivery charges. So choose a location near the vendors and suppliers.
• Do think about the prospects as well . It is likely that in the coming future when your restaurant business will be growing, you will have to acquire more employees and purchase more equipment. More customers will be walking in your restaurant, so you should be able to assess whether your restaurant can provide adequate seating, parking, storage, preparation areas, etc.

b) Target Audience Analysis

It is important to do a Target Audience Analysis to come up with a comprehensive Restaurant Business Plan. It is not necessary to appeal to everyone.   You should know whom your restaurant will be serving, which class they would belong to, and their specific food habits, and their spending habits.   The aim of doing a target audience analysis is to know which portion of the population is most likely to come to your restaurant.  Analyze the customer demographic and the behavior of the customers that you are aiming to target.

For analyzing, first,  you have to conduct primary research of what constitutes the population near your restaurant.  For example, if you are opening up a restaurant in a student-centric area surrounded by PGs and hostels, it will be better if you are running a fast-food restaurant, a takeaway joint, or casual dining serving at a lower price and with more funky interiors. If you are planning to open up a restaurant in a residential area or where there are a lot of corporate offices, they will usually have a higher spending capacity.  So depending on that you can go for casual dining or fine dining.  Also, your target customers should be living within 3 miles of the location of your restaurant. The closer, the better it is. Accordingly, plan out your mediums of marketing as well which would appeal to your target customers.

c) Competition Analysis

High competition is one of the biggest challenges of the restaurant industry.  However, the competition can also have a positive impact on your restaurant business, as it would bring in the customers. Also, if you do not have any competitor in an area, it may mean that none of your competitors were able to survive the market there so you should take a second look at the location before finalizing it for your restaurant. Still, while opening a new restaurant, you should analyze the competition in the area in terms of both the present competitors and the prospective ones. You should identify and include the list of restaurants with similar concepts as yours in your Restaurant Business Plan. After you have already identified your competitors, you need to conduct your research in the following areas:

• The market segment your competitors serve.
• The item which is maximum purchased by the customers.
• What promotion/marketing strategies are being used by the competitor.
• Serving capacity, operational hours of your competitors.
• The strengths and weaknesses of your competitors.
• The growth rate of your competitors . You can conduct primary research on these aspects by visiting the places or secondary research by regularly following the updates on their website, reviews on their pages, and their other social media profiles.

4.  SWOT Analysis

Doing a SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, and Threats) Analysis must be included in your Restaurant Business Plan as it helps you identify internal and external factors that would impact the restaurant’s future. Not only does it warn you regarding what could go wrong and what your weaknesses are, but it also gives you a detailed insight regarding your strengths and opportunities so you will be able to use them better.

a) Strength-  Strengths are the strong points of your restaurant that can drive its growth. They are the reasons your restaurant will be a success. Strengths are the first thing you analyze while writing a restaurant business plan. Your strengths can include things like the USP of your restaurant, competitive pricing, prime location, quick service, etc.

b) Weakness- Weaknesses are the weak links in your restaurant that can slow its growth. These are the things that your restaurant is not good at but they can be worked upon. It is also essential to consider the weakness of your restaurant so that you may be prepared to tackle the problems that may arise from them. For instance, as a new business, your weakness may be an unestablished brand identity or untrained staff.

c) Opportunity- Opportunities are upcoming trends in the market which no one has grasped onto yet. If grasped at the right time and invested in, opportunities can take your business to the next level. Analyze the gaps in the current market trends and note how you can benefit from them. For example, as a new concept in the area, you can have a First Mover Advantage. A viable opportunity can be anything like the increase in demand for vegan food or even the availability of better restaurant technology.

d) Threats- Threats can be anything that may pose damage to your restaurant business. These are external factors that you have no control over yet they may hamper business. These can range from anything; from a new restaurant competition to a sudden shortage of supplies. The best way to deal with threats to your restaurant business is to prepare how you will tackle them in advance and include it in your restaurant business plan.

5. Operations Plan

The Operations Plan is an integral part of your Restaurant Business Plan as it includes how the restaurant would function in the daily operations.

a) Staff Management

Another significant challenge that you are going to face after you have found your space, planned the layout and the interiors have been done is finding the right people to run your restaurant. You should be aware that your restaurant is a labor-intensive business. Your team is the backbone of your restaurant so they should be treated with the utmost care. When your restaurant is in profits, you need to make your team a part of your success so that they also feel a participated in happiness.

The Restaurant Business Plan should include points such as the number of employees you would need in each area of operations, such as the Kitchen and the Service Area. Also include the entire Recruitment Procedure, Job Descriptions, and the Training Manual. 

As a general rule, you will need the following staff

• Kitchen staff:  Cooks, assistants, prep staff, pantry, washing staff. For bars, you will also need bartenders.
• Service staff:  Waiters, orders takers, counter staff, delivery staff, cleaning, housekeeping, security.
• Management staff: Restaurant manager, chef, cashier, storekeeper, purchase manager.

Spotting the Right Employee

Before writing the business plan, the restaurant owner should decide whether the staff and team will comprise only localities or migrants from smaller towns and cities as well. It is always better to include a mixed culture of people which will not only create a backup during respective festive seasons but also will bring diversity to the restaurant. No matter who you select, the employees you hire must match certain standards. Your wait staff must have good communication skills and a charming personality, your kitchen staff must be agile and quick on their feet, your manager must not only be a good employee but a good leader as well.

Training the Staff

To ensure that your staff is up to date with industry standards, you should hold training sessions regularly related to food preparation, healthy kitchen practices, smart waste management, approaching the customers with a professional attitude, handling customers’ reviews and complaints, and so on. Do not just assume that an employee is supposed to know his/her job. Create a training manual and train your employees according to it. If you merely give them a booklet and expect them to learn it and und implement it on their own, it will lead to a lot of miscommunication in the team leading to poor customer service and lousy restaurant performance.  Create a Training Plan for your employees and make the hired employees undergo extensive training before the opening of the restaurant.

b) Customer Service

Deciding upon the kind of service that you would provide in your restaurant is essential and must be included in the Restaurant Business Plan as it affects the entire guest experience. You should decide the type of customer service that you would be provided based on your restaurant format.

• Table d’ hotel ( TDH )-  A table d’hôte menu in restaurant terminology can be defined as a menu where multi-course meals with only a few choices are charged at a fixed total price. Such a menu may be called a prix fixe or fixed price. The terms set meal and set menu are also used. The cutlery on the table is already set for all of the courses.
• A la carte-  Table d’hôte contrasts with à la carte, where customers may order any of the separately priced menu items available. À la carte is an English language loan phrase meaning “according to the menu”. It refers to food that can be ordered as separate items, rather than part of a set meal.
• Silver service or Platter to Plate-  Silver service is a method of food service that usually includes serving food at the table. It is a technique of transferring food from a dish to the guest’s plate from the left.  The waiter does this by using service forks and spoons from the diner’s left. Plates are cleared from the right, glasses from the right; again by starting with the guest to the host’s right. Glasses are stacked in a diagonal to the right and away, with wine (by course) in order and then water glass.

6. Financials

While writing the business plan for a restaurant, the most important point to remember when it comes to finances is to be realistic. You should have a personal financial statement and balance sheet in place, with the regular cash flow statement. The owner should be aware of all the cash inflows and outflows and should carefully keep track of all the money that is debited and credited in the business accounts. The owner should also be conservative in the initial days of the restaurant. 

It is not necessary that your first-day sales will be replicated and when you are a new restaurant, money is slow. Apart from that reaching break-even as soon as possible is important to stay afloat and make profits thus cash should never be taken for granted. For example, a lot of times the restaurant owners become too ambitious and they start expecting good revenue from the first day itself like Rs 10,000 on the first day and in the same proportion on the other days. This over- assumption may prove to be harmful because there might be an extreme case when there might not be a single customer in your restaurant so you should be prepared for it both psychologically and emotionally. Thus, Financial Analysis is an important part of the Restaurant Business Plan. You must include the Cash Flow Statement, Revenue Projections, and Cost Analysis in the Business Plan.

a) Cash Flow Statement

It is the record of where the money is coming from and where it is going. In other words, it is the mapping of your restaurant. This is one of the important tools which everybody should spend time on. Not only does it give you a clear picture of where the money is coming from and where it is going, but it is also crucial when it comes to planning for your restaurant’s future. To know more about why you must spend time on your cash flow statement, read  The Importance of a Cash Flow Statement

b) Capital: Where the money is coming from

This part of your restaurant business plan will comprise your financials or your partner’s financials and how much you are ready to invest. It will also include contingencies that may come up and funds for the same.

After mentioning how much your capital is and where it is coming from, you need to allocate funds to operating expenses, fixed expenses, marketing, and other departments of your restaurant. You will also mention how long you will support the system and when you expect to break even. Apart from that also set up a contingency fund for unforeseen events.

c) Expenses: Where the money is going

Capital and Operating Expenses give you the details of where the money is being spent.

• Capital expenses- Also called Fixed Costs, Capital Expenses are those expenses that are fixed in nature and are not recurring. These are long-term investments that you will do in your restaurant, like the cost of equipment and machinery, cost of utensils, interior designing cost, tables, chairs, cutlery, crockeries, wall hangings, chandeliers, etc.
• Operating Expenses – These are the costs that you will incur to run your restaurant. These are recurring costs like salary, depreciation on equipment, rent, electricity, etc. You need to assume these costs and the projection has to be made along with the operation team.
• Cost Projection-  The Cost projection of the restaurant should be done for at least 6 months.
• Revenue Projection- Understanding the scope of business is essential. Now that you have a survey about your localities, you have your operating team in place, you have your menu and cuisines decided, you have knowledge of the expenses and, you can then easily derive the revenue projection. Majorly in revenue projection, you need to understand the amount of footfall to expect.
• Revenue per person- As per the menu which you have created, you need to understand and analyze how much per person average you will be able to earn. Once you know that your APC (revenue per person) is X amount, then multiply with the assumed footfall and create the revenue projection for a daily, monthly, and quarterly basis.
•   Statements of Income- As for now, you have your expenses ready and so is your revenue projection, with these data you can calculate your gross profit/ Return on Investment/PBT /PBAT. This statement of income will be your roadmap for opening a restaurant.

It is always better to be a little conservative rather than generous when comes to revenue projection and more generous in terms of expense statements.

7. Restaurant Marketing

The F&B space is getting competitive day by day. Therefore, another essential step while writing a restaurant business plan is marketing.  You should have a clear picture of your market strategy beforehand. Plan out a budget for both online and offline marketing. For every rupee you earn, a portion should be dedicated to marketing the restaurant . Always have a visual block-free logo with a simple design and a simple name. However, the branding of a restaurant is determined by the country in which the restaurant is located.

a) Restaurant Launch

It is better to go for a soft launch before throwing an official launch party. A soft launch with your friends and family will give you unadulterated feedback of the restaurant and you will know what all to improve. At least after a buffer of 3-4 months, go for the official and the hard launch, where you would invite all the named and famous people of the industry and even outside the industry like politicians, journalists, food bloggers, and critics. The most common mistake the restaurateurs make is having a hard launch on the first day of their restaurant when they do not have a financial backup to provide free drinks and food to the people coming to the launch . So this buffer period of 3-4 months will not only give you and your employees the time to be well versed with handling operations of the restaurant but you will also have enough cash in hand for a successful launch.

b) Online and Offline Marketing

Plan out your marketing strategy on both online and offline platforms. Through your marketing strategy, define your restaurant’s specialties and state how your restaurant will stand apart despite the prevalent competition in the restaurant space. Your marketing strategy shall be determined by contemporary market trends. Smart marketing strategies use elements of all these promotional options to build a restaurant brand and engage the restaurant’s core customers while keeping costs manageable. You need to understand how to utilize the various channels on social media so that you get the maximum ROI from them.

Also, you could use your restaurant POS to create different marketing campaigns for your restaurant to increase overall sales and grow your brand name.

(i) Online Marketing

• Website: Your website can prove to be the most important channel for your marketing. You should be able to maintain an attractive, informative, and responsive website which will comprise all the important information about your restaurant. The stronger the impression that your website makes, the more publicity you’ll get from media outlets and review sites. List your restaurant website on online listing & travel websites like TripAdvisor, Zomato, Burrp & more. Also, do not forget to list your restaurant business on Google. You need to be discoverable all through the life of your business and Google is crucial to that. Read more about the importance of a website for your restaurant here.
• Blog:  You can start a blog for your restaurant that will allow you to promote your restaurant activities. A blog can help you by strengthening your digital reputation and a better SEO ranking and ability to build your database for newsletters, digital marketing, and email campaigns. You can get even more mileage from your blog by publishing posts by guest authors.
• Social Media Platforms-  Having a social media presence for any restaurant is very important. By adding social media to your marketing strategy, you can increase awareness about your restaurant amongst your clientele. You can promote discount coupons, offers, loyalty programs, and events on Facebook, Instagram & Twitter. Learn the tips for the social media success of your restaurant here.
• Email Marketing-  Email marketing has always been one of the most reliable forms of marketing for gaining customer loyalty. If you are new to this, you could also have software for your email marketing. The restaurants can show their regards to new subscribers with a discount code for their next visit. Email marketing is especially effective to nurture customers as opposed to getting new customers. Your customers should be able to send a direct reply to emails that you have sent out.  It is always advisable to not send an email from a ‘no-reply’ address. Include these points of email marketing for a restaurant in your restaurant business plan.

Find out how to do the digital marketing of your restaurant the right way here .

(ii) Offline Marketing

Apart from the online marketing of your restaurants, there are a lot of ideas for offline marketing for your restaurants.

• Engaging with Food Bloggers
• Hosting Events
• Advertising through signages and billboards
• Distributing pamphlets
• Radio Mentions
• Television or Newspaper Advertising

Learn more about Offline Marketing for restaurants here .

(iii) Customer Relationship Management

In today’s century, restaurants are facing unprecedented challenges in all aspects. One of the challenges is to cater to changing eating preferences and habits. So in such a scenario, it has become vital for restaurants to analyze and understand the differences and changes in the customers’ behavior, food preferences, eating habits, and then look for more opportunities to serve them better. Before the customers start coming in, you need to ensure how you will accumulate the customer data and use it to generate more business. Include the channels through which you will acquire the customer details in your restaurant business plan, and also the strategies through which you will engage with your future guests.

You should have software which covers various important aspects. It needs to integrate easily with the software that you are already using, and that may indeed require custom CRM development. Your main focus should be on customer retention and increasing sales growth. Learn how Integrated CRM increases Customer Loyalty and improves restaurant sales here. 

First of all, a CRM system aims to gather information about their customer to initiate the building of the customer relationship in 4 aspects:

1) The contact details of the customer (Phone number, email, address) 2)The frequency of visits  (what time of the week or month they tend to visit) 3) Preferences/ detailed profile of what they usually eat 4) Average Spend per visit.

Using the features of the Loyalty Program

Once your customer registers on your loyalty program, their profile is created. Then, it becomes easier to track the frequency of the customer’s visits, how much they spend per visit, what are their preferences. With this, you get an effective platform to engage and interact with your customers. With a loyalty program, any restaurant can give its customers advanced access to new dishes, special discount coupons, or a free meal.

• Real-time updates and personalized recommendations for your customers.
• You can Reward your loyal customers with a gift, a discount coupon. Stay in regular touch with your customers through email and text messages. You can send your customers a birthday/anniversary wish.
• You can give your customers something at the end of the meal with a sense of gratitude as a surprise.
• Also with the CRM system, after analyzing customers’ history, you will be able to find out if a particular customer is a vegetarian or a non-vegetarian. Then, depending on that if a new non-vegetarian dish is launched, it would be taken into account that the specific email about that dish does not go to the vegetarian customer. Thus, making the process of customer relationship building more specific to your valuable customers will help you in the longer run.
• Interact with your customers on social media platforms. Make them feel important.

RELATED ARTICLES MORE FROM AUTHOR

Michelin stars: what they are and how restaurants earn them, how to choose the best shoes for your restaurant staff, the complete guide to dynamic menu pricing for restaurants, 13 comments.

Awesome. Very useful pointers to consider for your Restaurants business plan. Thank you for providing such a valuable information.

good pointers

Great article. Must read before starting a restaurant business.

Thank you for the valuable information!

It’s a very good n important things to know the basic knowledge before starting the restaurant business ,thnx n i really appreciate for this beautiful article …..!!!!

The article is very well explained and is very comprehensive. A business plan will be the roadmap from which your new restaurant develops. No matter how much thought you’ve put into your concept or how many trusted colleagues have assured you of its greatness, you absolutely must write a business plan. It will prove the viability of your concept to potential investors and provide them with a clear and engaging answer to the question. Good Read.

Great tips on how to write a restaurant business plan. Please provide a downloadable restaurant business plan pdf also.

A very well-knit article. Creating a restaurant business plan in India is one of the first steps to start a successful restaurant venture. This article will come in handy for all the aspiring restaurant owners who are on the lookout for a detailed guideline to kickstart the restaurant business operations. Well done! 🙂

Anyone who is planning to open a restaurant would totally agree that writing a restaurant business plan is not an easy task. I like how this article talks about every aspect that will help map out a restaurant business plan, would highly recommend this article!

hello…. Great Article Very useful pointers to consider for Restaurants business. Thank you for sharing such a valuable information with us.

very very useful and thorough….

Hi want to connect with professional who can help me in setting a bakery. Right from kitchen setup to the shop.

LEAVE A REPLY Cancel reply

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

LATEST POSTS

Unveiling the minds of restaurant consultants in bangalore: a journey through..., éxito en ebullición: cómo coffeefy redefinió el trabajo y el ocio, brewing success: how coffeefy redefined work and leisure, from tech to taste: karl goodhew’s inspiring journey of innovation, spacex engineer to pizza pioneer: the journey of benson tsai.

POPULAR POSTS

Not‌ ‌just‌ ‌an‌ ‌old‌ ‌fashioned‌ ‌bar‌ ‌but‌ ‌a‌ ‌blend‌ ‌of‌ ‌imagination‌..., build greater brand engagement for your cloud kitchen by leveraging online..., 6 cloud kitchen marketing ideas every business owner should know in..., popular category.

• Restro Gyaan 430
• Foodpreneurs 243
• Technology 88
• Resources 74
• Trending 61
• Singapore 57

A Complete Guide For Starting A Food Catering Business

Essential restaurant equipment for running your restaurant kitchen efficiently in 2023.

• Create An Account
• Returns & Orders

How to Write a Restaurant Business Plan

A restaurant business plan is the foundation when starting a new restaurant , whether you're opening a franchise or a small family-owned restaurant. Your business plan will act as a roadmap for starting your restaurant: it can help you get loans from financial institutions , and it will be a point of reference when forecasting sales. In this article, we'll teach you all of the essential information to include in your restaurant business plan as well as walk you through the process of writing a restaurant business plan.

What Should You Include in a Restaurant Business Plan?

Your business plan will be a guide through the process of starting a new business, but you may also share it with potential investors, so there's a number of useful things that you'll want to include in it. Here are some key ideas to include in your restaurant business plan:

• Concept: Your restaurant's concept is the theme that ties all of the elements, such as your menu and decor, together. Having a strong concept is essential for opening a successful restaurant.
• Sample Menu: Early in the process of starting a restaurant, you should think about what type of food you want to make and sell. Your sample menu doesn't need to be extensive, but give readers a few examples of the types of food you're planning on serving.
• Management Structure: Investors will want to know how your restaurant is structured. Are you going to be the sole owner or is it a partnership? Are you starting an LLC or taking sole proprietorship?
• Market Analysis: Is your new restaurant going to be located in a competitive market? What are the demographics in that region? Is your business going to be able to succeed in the current market? These are all issues that you should cover in your restaurant's business plan.
• Financials: The centerpiece of every business plan are the financials. Be sure to have answers to how much money you're planning on spending, how long it'll take to become profitable, and where you're planning on getting financing.

These are some of the topics that you should cover throughout your restaurant business plan. This information will be spread out through the various sections of the document, but having concrete answers to these questions and topics will help your business prepare for the challenges of opening.

Sections in a Restaurant Business Plan

Business plans are typically split it up into multiple sections to keep them organized. There are eight essential sections in restaurant business plans, which are listed below. You can click on the section to learn more about it.

• Executive Summary
• Company Description
• Concept and Menu
• Management and Ownership Structure
• Employees and Staffing Needs
• Market and Competitor Analysis
• Advertising and Marketing Strategies

We will detail the contents of each section and how to write them in the sections below.

Restaurant Business Plan Sample Breakdown

Below is an in-depth look at each section of a restaurant business plan, what information you should include, and how to write them.

1. Executive Summary

The executive summary is a brief overview of all the information contained in your restaurant business plan. A strong executive summary is essential not only for starting a business, but also for getting funding for your new restaurant, as it is the first section potential investors will read. A business plan executive summary should be between 1 and 4 pages long, and it should contain the most important information about your new restaurant. The goal of an executive summary is to get your foot in the door with investors and banks to procure startup capital.

Here is some of the information that should be included in the executive summary:

• Your restaurant's concept.
• The restaurant's mission statement .
• A realistic timeline for opening your restaurant.
• Your target location and how much building space your restaurant needs.
• A brief market analysis.
• What makes your new restaurant unique.
• The restaurant's core strengths, such as experienced management or talented chefs.
• Expected costs, business goals, and financial projections for starting your restaurant.

Think of your executive summary as an elevator pitch to potential investors and banks. It should be a very brief summary of the plan for opening your new restaurant and stress why your restaurant is worth investing in.

Tips for Writing an Executive Summary

Once you have all the information you want to include, here are a few tips for writing a persuasive and concise restaurant executive summary:

• Be concise and to the point. The ideal executive summary is short and to the point and doesn't hide the important information behind flowery language.
• Know who you're presenting your business plan to and write your executive summary accordingly. Think about who you're going to present your restaurant business plan to and what they're most interested in, and place that information front and center.
• Avoid cliches and superlatives. Avoid claims that you can't back up, such as "we make the best cheesesteaks in the world!" or "our clam chowder is the best in the city."
• Be authentic. Let your passion for foodservice and food show through in your executive summary.

2. Company Description

The company description section, also called a company overview, contains all of the same information as the executive summary, but provides greater detail on each part of your business plan. For example, your company description should include more detailed financial projections and any marketing strategies you've designed.

In a restaurant business plan, the executive summary will get readers interested, and then your company overview has more in-depth information that you can give them to give a complete overview of your new restaurant. Additionally, the company overview of your business plan is your chance to explain, in more specific terms, how and why you're opening a restaurant.

When writing a company description, be sure to answer these questions:

• What is your restaurant's concept?
• What makes your restaurant unique?
• What sort of items will be on your menu?
• Who is your target audience, and what are their spending and eating habits?
• What team members do you have lined up?
• How is your restaurant going to function in a day-to-day capacity?
• What sort of management structure are you planning to use?
• Do you have any logos or marketing materials prepared?

Back To Top

3. Restaurant Concept and Menu

While you may cover your restaurant's concept and menu ideas in other sections of your restaurant business plan, this section allows you get into the finer details. You can divide this section up into three main parts: menu, service, and decor. We'll break down each section below.

Menu Ideas and Design

You can include your sample menu design in this section. If you don't have a full mockup of your restaurant's menu, then list some of the items or recipes that you're planning on using.

Restaurant Service

Are you planning on opening a fine dining restaurant or a fast casual establishment? Will you have a full-time wait staff or just a service counter where customers can order and pick up their food? For many restaurants offering standard service, this section will be fairly short.

Design and Decor

This is the section of your business plan where you can show any branded materials or logos that have already been designed for your new restaurant. Additionally, you can include any design and decor choices you've made, such as your color scheme , furniture choices, or tableware aesthetic.

4. Management and Ownership Structure

This section of your restaurant business plan is all about the ownership structure of your new business, what type of business ownership you're creating, and how your management team will be set up.

There are several types of ownership structures , each with their own benefits. Here's a brief overview of some of the most popular business ownerships in the restaurant industry:

• Sole Proprietorship: This ownership structure has one person who owns the whole restaurant. This is the easiest structure to set up, and it makes filing taxes simple since it's taxed as part of the owner's personal taxes. While it offers many benefits, sole proprietorship offers no protections for the owner if the business were to fail or take on debt.
• Partnerships: Partnerships are similar to sole ownership, but they have two or more owners. Usually, partners bring different sets of expertise to the table, which can be a benefit when opening a new restaurant. But, there are similar downsides to sole ownership, such as limited protection in case of failure.
• Limited Liability Corporations (LLC): Offering the most personal protection, LLCs act as a separate business entity. They are very tax efficient and flexible, but they can be time consuming and complicated to set up, especially if you're a first time business owner.

Management Structure

In addition to listing how your new business will be organized, you need to consider how your new restaurant is going to run on a day-to-day basis and how it's going to be managed. Will you, the restaurant owner, be acting as the manager or are you planning on hiring management staff? Will you have separate managers for the front- and back-of-house areas?

It's best to have these protocols in place when you're writing your restaurant business plan so you can reference them during the process of opening your restaurant.

5. Staffing and Employment

Once you've laid out your restaurant's ownership and management structures, you can get into the finer details of your staffing needs. In this section, you can lay out exactly what your staffing needs are, such as how many servers you'll need, kitchen staff requirements, as well as any employees, such as managers or chefs, that you already have on staff.

Additionally, it will be worth noting in this section if you, the owner, will be working in the restaurant in a management or chef role. You can also list any employee handbooks or wait staff training materials you have prepared.

Be sure to also list any auxiliary employees that are affiliated with your restaurant, such as accountants, lawyers, advertising agencies, or contractors.

6. Market Analysis

Requiring some of the most research, the market analysis section of your restaurant business plan will explain to potential investors how your new business will fit into the existing market. This section can also be broken down further into two main types of analysis: demographic analysis and competitive analysis.

Demographic Analysis

Understanding your target demographic is essential for success when opening a new restaurant. You can detail information about your target demographic in this section of your restaurant business plan. Here is some important information to include:

• What's the age of your target demographic?
• What is their income level?
• How much disposable income do they have?
• How much money do they typically spend on eating out?

This information will help you understand your potential customers, what they're interested in, their eating and spending habits, so you can adapt to cater to their wants and needs. When writing this section of your restaurant business plan, you want to make sure that you're in-depth, and you can also use the data to draw conclusions to persuade potential investors.

Competitive Analysis

The other half of market analysis is analyzing the competition in your restaurant's chosen location . Established restaurants will have a loyal customer base, so you need to make sure that your business is targeting a different demographic or has a competitive edge that can entice customers away from your competitors.

Here are some things to think about when compiling competitive analysis:

• How many restaurants are in your target area?
• Do any of these competitors offer similar menus or services to your new restaurant?
• How do their menu prices compare to your menu?
• Are there any non-traditional competitors in the area, such as grocery stores and convenience stores offering ready-to-go meals?

Once you lay out this information in your restaurant business plan, you can begin to describe your plan for competing with these businesses and gaining a loyal following.

Also consider how close other restaurants have to be to your own to be considered competition. If you're in a city the sphere of competition may only be a few square blocks, but it could be several miles in rural or suburban locations.

7. Marketing and Advertising Strategies

After you've identified your target demographics and competitors in the previous section, you can begin outlining your plan to appeal to those customers and to compete with other businesses in your area in the marketing and advertising strategies section.

There are a number of marketing and advertising tactics that your business can take to get your new restaurant's name out there. Some of the most popular options include hosting opening day events, starting a social media marketing campaign , offering coupons to potential customers, or creating customer loyalty programs.

In this section, you'll want to list all of the marketing and advertising strategies you're planning on implementing, how they'll benefit your business, what exactly is involved in each tactic, and how you're planning to enact them. For example, you can detail how you're going to hire a marketing agency to create a run a social media account for your restaurant to create excitement before it opens.

8. Financial Data

One of the most important sections in your restaurant business plan, the financial data will also require the most significant amount of research and work on your part. To find this financial data you can use experience from previous restaurants you've worked at or operated, use estimates from suppliers, and research available financial information in your specific region.

You should organize the information in your financial section based on the people you're presenting your business plan to. For example, if you're preparing a presentation for the bank to receive a loan, you will want to put information about how long it will take your business to become profitable and a break-even analysis at the beginning of this section.

Regardless of how you organize the data in the financials section of your restaurant business plan, here is some information that you want to make sure you include:

• How much capital you have on hand currently.
• A breakdown of your expected startup costs, such as new kitchen equipment , lease payments, renovations, or licensing fees.
• A timeline of how long you expect it will take for your restaurant to become profitable.
• How much money you expect your business will spend on a daily and weekly basis.
• Sales forecasting based on previous experience or competitor data.
• A list of recurring expenses, such as overhead, labor, and food costs.

When writing your restaurant business plan, be sure to consider the person that's going to be reading it and the information they're most interested in. But, also keep in mind that your business plan will be a reference for you to follow throughout the process of opening your new restaurant, and fill it will information that is not only helpful to potential investors, but also you and your management team.

Related Resources

Independent Ownership vs. Restaurant Franchising

Whether you're considering investing in a franchise or thinking about starting an independent restaurant, the types of risks and the potential rewards

How to Write a Bakery Business Plan

Starting your own bakery is no easy task. Many people have tried and failed to get their business ideas off the ground, or worse, their business flopp

Restaurant Profit and Loss Statement Explained

While there are several ways to measure and ensure the success of your restaurant, the best way to understand your restaurant’s financial progress is

• Topics 1397
• Industrial 55
• Troubleshooting Guides 23
• Restaurant Management 130
• Bar Management 59
• Catering Tips 38
• Bakery Management 43
• Food Trucks & Concessions 50
• Advertising & Marketing 37
• Eco-Friendly Tips 11
• Facility Layout & Design 43
• Coffee Shop Tips 29
• Installation & Maintenance 54
• Janitorial & Pest Control 30
• Safety & Sanitation 93
• Startup Tips 104
• Menu Design 10
• Kitchen & Cooking Tips 85
• Hospitality Management 24
• Pizza & Sandwich Shop Tips 37
• Smallwares 37
• Food Prep 96
• Tabletop Items 18
• Disposables 23
• Calculators & Tools 6
• Consumables 53
• Warewashing & Laundry 18
• Cooking Equipment 96
• Food Storage & Refrigeration 52
• Beverage Equipment 37
• Office Supplies 6
• Resource Type
• Troubleshooting 2
• In-Depth Articles 286
• Buying Guides 311
• Product Reviews 81

Join Our Mailing List

Receive coupon codes and more right to your inbox.

How to Define Your Restaurant’s Goals and Objectives (Examples Included)

Table of contents.

When trying to plan for your restaurant, it’s important to have points in the future that you want to achieve. Generally, we call these restaurant goals and objectives. While we’ll break down exactly what that means shortly, the simple fact is that the goals and objectives of a restaurant are a major part of their success.

So, how do you define your restaurant objectives and goals and, importantly, why should you?

Understanding Restaurant Goals and Objectives

First things first, we need to understand the terms that we’re discussing. While they may seem like the same thing at first, restaurant objectives and goals are actually quite different. 

Goals are your long-term plans (expansions, major increases in sales, etc.); they’re what you plan your extended business around — we’re talking at least a year in the future. In contrast, your objectives are shorter-term tasks that fill up that time between now and your first major goal. Generally, these will include small and, notably, achievable tasks that can be accomplished within a few weeks or months. 

Key Areas for Setting Restaurant Goals

When trying to establish long-term goals, it’s vital to understand the most important areas on which you should focus. Below, we have a handful of areas that (if you focus on them properly) will help your business take massive strides to improve year over year.

Financial Goals

Arguably the most obvious of restaurant goals are your financials; most people tend to set a specific number for their long-term (year over year) growth. 

Financial goals don’t have to just focus on having a specific number sitting in your account; rather, they should have specific end-game plans behind the number. Whether that’s building a suitable emergency fund, having enough to buy new (expensive) equipment, or building a down payment for a second (or third, or fourth…) location, set yourself clear and measurable goals.

Operational Goals

Operational restaurant goals are a crucial aspect to long-term success for any restaurant. While money is a great way to measure growth, the things that matter the most are often the way that your restaurant runs on a daily basis. Whether this applies to your front or back of house is up to you, but ultimately, it’s important to set internal goals for your staff to meet.

A great place to start with operational restaurant goals is consistency. Hold an all-hands meeting and establish clear boundaries and goals for your team to meet within a year. Tell your staff that you’ll be watching table turnover times, upselling, plate times, and return rates on food and then give them incentive . This can be as simple as extra PTO or a small bonus, or it can lead to raises or promotions; what matters is that they’re incentivized to work alongside you to improve the business.

Customer Service Goals

Generally customer service falls under operational goals, but it’s important to differentiate when setting long-term goals for multiple areas of your business. When establishing restaurant goals for customer service, think about what can improve over an extended period of time. 

Areas like reviews and sales allow you to properly measure success; this is important, because customer service is a difficult thing to measure, as customers are their own people. Extreme cases of good or bad customer service will be obvious, but they’re difficult to measure when trying to set and meet goals. Aiming for more 5-star reviews and higher sales allows your staff to have concrete proof of their work and, importantly, show how well they do their job.

Beyond the more measurable parts of customer service, it’s also great to set more personal goals for your staff. Set goals with each employee to see them sell more confidently, become more familiar with the menu and specials, or even just to be more comfortable in their interactions with customers. Importantly, though, be sure to work with your employees on this, rather than setting goals without speaking to them.

Marketing and Branding Goals

Branding and marketing are both important parts to growing your restaurant business. By establishing clear goals for what your brand should look like, how it should be perceived, and how well-known it is (also known as brand awareness ), you’ll be setting your business up for success. 

Just like any other type of marketing, restaurant marketing benefits from clear goals and objectives for each campaign. Common restaurant goals for marketing and branding include an increase in followers, regular interaction on social media, or even a full rebrand! 

By setting yourself a clear picture of what successful marketing will look like, you’re creating a point to work toward and, ultimately, overcome.

Staff Development and Retention Goals

Of all restaurant goals to establish, staff development and retention is one of the more crucial. We all know that restaurants are often a revolving door of employees, and likely, you’re familiar with the struggle that this can create. In fact, the act of training new employees actively costs you money !

This is why it’s vital for you to set goals related to staff retention and growth. Your employees will eventually grow out of their positions, and that’s okay,  but helping them to grow can ensure that they stick around far longer. Beyond coaching and professional development, there’s really only one major way to encourage retention — benefits and pay.

Because of this, your staff retention will likely be tied to your restaurant goals that revolve around money; after all, to pay more, you need to make more. Nonetheless, it’s worth it to consider the tradeoff of periodic raises versus the ( on average $1,252 per person ) cost of training new employees.

How to Set Achievable Restaurant Goals and Objectives

Now that we’ve seen what kinds of restaurant objectives and goals will likely be on the top of your list, let’s talk about creating achievable restaurant goals.

Using the SMART Framework

The SMART framework is a common tool used by project managers to clarify what is realistic and what isn’t. So, what is SMART? It operates under the idea that every project, objective, and goal should be:

• Specific: In other words, your restaurant objectives and goals should be specific enough to be easily achieved. Rather than “Make more money,” we should aim to make a specific amount, let’s say $10,000 more per quarter.
• Measurable: Similarly, your restaurant goals should be easy to measure; we don’t want abstract goals or objectives. Rather, they should be quantifiable through numbers or performance.
• Achievable: We’ve harped on the importance of achievability for your restaurant goals and objectives quite a bit. That’s because being realistic is crucial to actually accomplishing any task that you set for yourself. Allow yourself the time to think about how realistic it will be to achieve your goal or objective in a given time and make adjustments as needed .
• Relevant: The long and short here is that your goals should be relevant to your business. Set restaurant objectives and goals that will directly benefit your restaurant and, importantly, that will help enforce your vision for the business.
• Time-Bound: Finally, it’s important to have a deadline. Goals shouldn’t be an indefinite “we’ll get to it” process; rather, they should have a specific point in time where they need to be accomplished. 

Aligning Goals with Your Restaurant's Vision and Mission

In relation to the ‘relevant’ in SMART goals, be sure to think about what you want your restaurant to do and look like. Are you aiming to create a community gathering center or a space for intimate meals? Do you want to churn through orders and serve hundreds or thousands of guests each day, or do you want to serve a handful of guests with thoughtful, carefully crafted courses?

No matter your ultimate vision, keep it in mind when preparing your restaurant objectives and goals. They should help you achieve that vision, rather than hinder it — so consider your brand when establishing goals. 

Setting Priorities: What Matters Most?

Ultimately, what matters most isn’t something that we can tell you; it’s something you’ll need to decide for yourself. If you’re struggling with employee retention, that may be the most important for you. Alternatively, you could have a great internal flow, wonderful sales, and an absolutely dead social media — if that’s the case, then maybe marketing goals and objectives will serve you best. 

Realistically, this means that you’ll need to take time to take inventory of how your restaurant runs, audit your inventory and sales, and speak to your staff about what they think should be prioritized.

Examples of SMART Restaurant Goals

Before we wrap, let’s set a few examples of SMART restaurant goals to get your mind working on the same wavelength:

• Specific sales goals: After looking at your sales quarter over quarter, establish a number that you want your restaurant to reach in one month, in three, and in six. For example, you could aim for a 10% increase in special sales first, followed by 15% and 20%.
• Brand recognition: Set a specific number of followers to gain in six months, and another for one year. In that time, measure followers and their interaction with your content. For many restaurants, this can be as small as 100 new followers and comments or shares on every post; for others, you can aim big. It’s all about knowing what’s realistic for your business.
• Employee retention: If you generally run through staff every eight months, set a long-term goal to retain at least 75% of your staff for a full year. After that, bump it to two or three years. 

Setting restaurant goals and objectives isn’t difficult once you know how to do it. It just requires an awareness of your business that will take time and research to accomplish. From there, the SMART framework can make the process shockingly simple.

Grow Orders, Save Time & Eliminate Tablet Chaos

Integrate your delivery apps and online orders with your POS and consolidate them into a single tablet. Helping you reduce order issues, grow your sales, and eliminate delivery headaches.

Continue Reading

Restaurant Chart of Accounts: How to Organize and Maintain Your Financials

Restaurant Painting Ideas: Tips to Elevate Your Interior

How Much Does it Cost to Open a Restaurant? Restaurant Startup Costs Explained

Our website uses cookies. By continuing to navigate, we assume your permission to deploy cookies as detailed in our Privacy Policy .

Power your business with Square

Millions of companies use Square to take payments, manage staff, and conduct business in-store and online.

• Starting Your Business
• Reaching Customers
• Selling Anywhere
• Managing Your Finances
• Operating Your Business
• Growing Your Team
• Inside Square
• Collections
• Case Studies

Subscribe to our newsletter

Most popular, how to start a restaurant, opening a barbershop: the complete step-by-step guide, the ultimate seo guide for any stage business, how to open a pop-up shop, loyalty programs: why they matter and how to start one, examples of how to write a payment reminder email to a client, what is crm, 13 email marketing best practices that get results, how to create and use qr codes for your business, the complete list of apple pay retailers, does your android phone have nfc here’s how to enable it, break-even point formula and analysis: how to calculate bep for your business, how to accept apple pay at your small business, what are ach payments and how do ach transactions work, bank transfers: what they are and how to do them, how to set up recurring invoices, what is cost of goods sold and how do you calculate it, how to choose the best online booking system for your business, how sms can help grow your business, employee handbooks – how to write one and what to include, 10 scientifically proven ways to motivate employees, how to hire employees: a checklist, a new hire onboarding checklist for remote and in-person employees, all set thank you for participating in #shopsmall, history of the u.s. currency, the us financial system and alexander hamilton, make the most out of square: our hottest new features, securing your customer data: 9 tips for small businesses, digging in: rethinking the restaurant business model to boost profitability.

• Business Growth
• Food and Beverage

About this series

Table of contents

When I opened my first restaurant twelve years ago, three things were crucial: Great food. A strong team. A solid location. Today restaurant owners have to do so much more to start on the right foot. A strong social media presence is a must. Easy online ordering is table stakes these days. But to really grow, more owners are moving toward what we at Square call a multihyphenate business model — introducing new offerings and changing the restaurant business model as we know it. 

It truly feels like a movement. Nearly all (90%) business leaders surveyed in our Future of Restaurants report said they want to make more money through new offerings this year. Some owners are adding new items to their menu. Others are selling merchandise online and in person, while other restaurants are beginning to offer totally new services like subscriptions, events, and classes. 

Don’t get me wrong. Finding creative ways to generate even more revenue is a big feat. Marketing new business offerings and managing additional inventory, which is already a grueling process, can create giant headaches. Plus, rising food and labor costs could mean you’re already dealing with tighter margins than ever . To expand successfully, it takes careful preparation, clear goals, and strong communication with your team. Paired with the right restaurant technology, you can easily add new offerings and make them profitable. 

Turning my casual fine dining restaurant into something bigger

My team opened Puritan & Company , a casual fine-dining restaurant with an emphasis on New England fare, in Cambridge in 2012. When we began thinking about how we could expand, we found we could pretty easily reach more guests by offering delivery. This was only shortly after third-party applications like DoorDash and Uber Eats helped make takeout from full-service restaurants mainstream, and well before many of us were regularly working (and eating) at home. No, we weren’t the first ghost kitchen in the Boston area. But we were one of the first high-profile restaurants to create a side brand with a specific focus on home delivery. We opened Puritan Trading Company in 2018 as a restaurant inside Puritan & Company, operating as a to-go model. 

When we launched, we knew it was important to create something different to avoid cannibalizing our business. But we also needed to think carefully about what new ingredients we needed to order and how this new offering would work with our current kitchen stations to avoid costly operational challenges. While designing the menu, we also focused on offering items that traveled well in takeout containers.

But we didn’t stop there. Over the years, we have monitored our customer preferences and behaviors. That led us to even more new beginnings. Not only do guests want the option to order food to go, but more guests are excited about dining in person today. With this in mind, we recently transformed the small, unused space we had next door to Puritan & Company and opened up Puritan Oyster Bar.

It was a perfect opportunity. We didn’t need to build an additional full kitchen. And despite being a small space, we’re able to direct any overflow seating to an adjacent event space.

Optimize every part of your restaurant with a cloud-based POS

Tips for expansion.

If you’re thinking about tweaking your restaurant’s business model, there are key pieces of advice I’d suggest after looking back on my experience expanding Puritan & Company. Keep these things in mind as you evaluate your opportunities:  

1. Always start with what your customers want. 

For any new concept to be successful, you have to know what choices your customers already have in front of them. Evaluating your neighborhood can help you uncover any gaps in the market. It’s also helpful to see which concepts do really well that you can learn from. 

If you run your restaurant on Square, you can look at your Dashboard data to understand your customers better. Gut check your expansion plans against critical points like when your restaurant is busiest, what your top-selling menu items are, and more.

2. Make sure your team is all in.

Some of our employees joined our restaurant when we first opened because they were passionate about being a part of highly culinary, chef-driven experiences. By launching Puritan Trading Company and adding a new, more casual menu, we were asking them to change their role. It’s clear to me now that not everyone was sold. So make sure to share your plans for expansion with your crew early and often. That way, you know whether you need to hire additional help or offer support to your current team through extra training. 

3. Set a launch date and work back from it.

To turn your expansion idea into action, start by setting a date to launch. As best you can, try to hold yourself to the timeframe you determine. Then, once you’ve launched, be sure to measure your results. While outcomes might be slow in the beginning, learning can be incredibly beneficial early on.

Using tools that integrate with Square for Restaurants, like Square Online and Team Management tools, you can easily access merch sales or the effectiveness of your team.

4. Start small at first.

In my eyes, the process of expanding your restaurant through new offerings is like building software. You have to actually break it down, iterate, get feedback, and throw out a process when necessary. Ultimately, this will de-risk any strategy you embark on. It’s much more painful and costly to shut down something that requires substantial capital to start. Start small and get it right first.

A new restaurant era

Rethinking your restaurant’s business model comes with challenges. But by growing in new ways, you can also get in front of more different customers, increase your sales volumes, and establish more predictability within your finances. All of that helps with your overall margins. The winners will undoubtedly be those who not only have a plan but also embrace technology to help them explore, test, and learn their way into new revenue-growing tactics.

Growing your restaurant? Learn how it’s done.

More from this series

No. 2 Digging In: From First Opening, the Restaurant Business Metrics You Should Track

No. 1 Digging In: The State of AI and Automation for QSRs and Where This Trend Is Headed

Want to add a coffee shop to your business here are the total costs, the future of restaurants report: 2024 edition, the top restaurant trends in 2024, tell us a little more about yourself to gain access to the resource..

Please refer to our Privacy Policy or contact us for more details.

Thank you! Check your email for your resource.

Content types.

• Beauty and Personal Care
• Professional Services
• Entertainment
• Health and Fitness

Square solutions

• Square Payments
• Square Point of Sale
• Square Online
• Square Checking
• Square Marketing
• Square Payroll

Based on your region, we recommend viewing our website in:

• Australia (English)
• Canada (English)
• Canada (Français)
• France (Français)
• Ireland (English)
• España (Español)
• Espanya (Català)
• United Kingdom (English)
• United States (English)
• Estados Unidos (Español)

Aaron Allen » Insights » 5 Case Studies to Help You Grow in the Restaurant Industry

5 Case Studies to Help You Grow in the Restaurant Industry

With over 2,000 engagements across 100+ countries, Aaron Allen & Associates has helped some of the world’s most recognized restaurant chains, investors, suppliers, and tech companies achieve remarkable growth. We’re sharing five restaurant case studies that showcase how we’ve driven enterprise value and transformed challenges into opportunities.

These examples offer insights into how strategic actions can lead to significant, measurable results….

Our client list, as may be expected, includes many esteemed brands throughout the world. Moreover, our experience means that we have a deep knowledge of the players, market dynamics, trends, and both the micro and macro factors shaping the industry around the globe.  We are restricted by confidentiality agreements and the boundaries of our own ethical sensibilities from disclosing our clients past and present, and therefore do not provide full client lists out of an abundance of caution for discretion.  Below is a brief sampling of some of the initiatives and results we have helped our clients implement and achieve.

Restaurant Case Study #1: Casual Dining Chain Leveraging the Menu as a Catalyst for a Turnaround

Focused on reinvigorating a  casual dining  national brand through  strategic marketing , operational improvements, and executive leadership guidance during critical transition periods.

BACKGROUND AND CHALLENGE

COMPANY STATS:

• Enterprise Value: ~$2b
• Sales: >$1b
• # Units: 100-150 range

Problems identified by AA&A:

• Slow service speeds and long customer wait times
• Highest volume profit centers bleeding the most traffic
• Understaffed in peak periods
• High employee turnover
• Inefficient equipment plans and layouts
• Menu misaligned

ACTION AND APPROACH

Granted special access to extensive data, AA&A utilized advanced data science techniques to identify and address operational bottlenecks and market opportunities.

• Process flows
• Menu ideation
• Signature items
• Capacity assessment
• Productivity benchmarking
• Guest experience assessment
• Price and performance correlation
• Menu merchandizing recommendations

RESULTS AND IMPACT

• Recommendations for  changes in kitchen equipment  leading to faster service and improving returned guests statistics
• Recommendations on ”can’t do at home” items, extensions on customization ability, signature items
• A streamlined menu helped improve margins, with Adjusted EBITDA going from 23% pre-engagement to over 27%

Take Action Today

Restaurant case study #2: multi-brand portfolio strategic mid- and long-term business plan advisory .

The client was a multi-brand, multi-product platform in  Latin America .

COMPANY STATS

• The group had 10-15 brands in LATAM and was backed by one of the most important family offices in the region
• Annual revenue in the $40m-$50m range, ~10% EBITDA

Scope of work:

• 5-year plans and priorities
• Roadmap and critical path
• Budget and CAPEX parameters
• Shared services and infrastructure
• Broad-brush organizational design
• Post-pandemic growth milestones
• Identifying target growth markets
• Brand strengths  and opportunities
• Franchising vs. corporate expansion
• Business model recommendations
• Timelines for expansion

Some of the strategic advice given by AA&A that the company followed:

• M&A: Divest — AA&A recommended divesting brands to focus on the high achievers. The company exited one of the brands identified as a low-margin brand
• 5-year plans are starting to be applied, with remodels happening selectively as well as SG&A, food cost, and labor cost optimization
• Labor cost optimization opportunity in one of the countries
• Opportunity to Optimize corporate SG&A with the divestiture of low-performing brand and units

Restaurant Case Study #3: Commercial Due Diligence and Investment Thesis Validation for Foodservice Tech Company

We supported a middle-market investment group in North America with more than $200m in assets under management investing across more than 20 industries. The company was doing  diligence  for an investment in a restaurant technology company in the U.S.

TARGET COMPANY STATS

• Leading company in its category (top two by sales)
• Had raised a cumulative of close to $100m in funding at the time of the project

Support with custom research to evaluate the market, positioning, and risk of a target company in the foodservice technology space. Insights into the foodservice industry landscape included:

• State of the Industry
• Total Addressable Market
• Competitive Landscape (past, present and future)
• Timelines for Growth, Partnerships
• Consumer Decision Process, Penetration and Retention
• Adoption Rates
• Risk and Relevance for the Technology
• Disruption and Mitigation Strategies
• Forward-Looking Support with Investment Thesis

ADVISE AND IMPACT

• The diligence work from AA&A advised in favor of the investment, with a few yellow flags for competitive threats
• Three years later, the target company had its IPO and raised more than $100m in cash, giving an opportunity to exit the investment and make a return in a short time

Start a Transformation

Restaurant case study #4: qsr operations audit and sales turnaround for  multi-brand f&b group.

Illustrated comprehensive value creation through operational and financial analysis, leading to an IPO and substantial revenue growth. The focus was to streamline operations, ignite growth, and pave the way for a substantial IPO.

• ~20 brands across 15-25 countries and 2,000+ outlets
• Large operator in Food Away From Home and QSR across MENA
• Master franchisee and proprietary brands
• On-site field work, visiting every major market for each brand (1k+ photo observations)
• P&L gap analysis
• Systems gap analysis, accuracy, SOPs assessment
• Location performance cross-section assessment
• Labor analysis
• Purchasing analysis, supplier analysis
• Menu analysis, comps
• Tech stack gap analysis
• Employee survey, morale assessment

This project demonstrates AA&A’s capability to facilitate large-scale strategic overhauls and highlights our expertise in steering companies towards successful public offerings

• Sales Turnaround : Strategic initiatives, particularly in technology and operational efficiencies, led to a +12% boost in same-store sales for the leading brand
• Investment into New Categories : strategic advice to acquire brand rights for high-growth-forecast categories led to the expansion in coffee
• Service Standards : suggestions to improve service, speed, order accuracy, and cleanliness led the company to obtain accolades from the franchisor and improvements in operations compliance scores of 60%
• Productivity improvements : the year after the engagement employee productivity increased by close to 10%

Restaurant Case Study #5: Comprehensive Understanding of the Foodservice Equipment Landscape

An Original Equipment Manufacturer (“OEM”) had questions relative to commercial foodservice equipment purchases, technology/innovation, and restaurant decision-making. The company was looking to get a  comprehensive understanding  of the foodservice equipment (FSE) landscape to decide whether or not to get into the foodservice space at scale.

• $20-$30 billion range in annual revenue
• More than $1 billion adjusted free-cash-flow
• 60k-80k employees range

Insights into the foodservice industry landscape, including:

• Competitive landscape
• Deep dives into competitors’ product portfolio
• Equipment acquisition cycles for restaurant chains
• Restaurant chain typical equipment allocations
• Equipment efficiencies in labor, maintenance, food cost, etc.
• Complexity and variations by type of restaurant segment
• Cost of switching/stickiness
• Restaurant decision-making process (mind of the buyer)
• Decision-making for franchisors vs. franchisees
• Operating model OEM-dealer/distributor

Drawing on our firm’s industry experience, expertise, network, know-how, and know-who, we applied a holistic approach and combined anecdotal, qualitative, and quantitative insights to provide answers and tools:

• Audited the competitive landscape and areas of opportunity
• Surfaced white space and identified gaps existing in the offerings of domestic commercial foodservice equipment providers
• Introduced opportunities for disruption via innovation related to labor automation and alternative formats
• Recommended a dual focus on North America as the biggest segment but also a different market as the fastest-growing
• Inorganic approach to fast growth

About Aaron Allen & Associates

Aaron Allen & Associates  is a global restaurant consultancy specializing in brand strategy, turnarounds, and value enhancement. We have worked with a wide range of clients including multibillion-dollar chains, hotels, manufacturers, associations and prestigious private equity firms.

We help clients imagine, articulate, and realize a compelling vision of the future, align and cascade resources, and engage and enroll shareholders and stakeholders alike to develop multi-year roadmaps that bridge the gap between current-state conditions and future-state ambitions. Learn More.

Global Restaurant Industry Experts

We are focused exclusively on the global foodservice and hospitality industry. You can think of us as a research company, think tank, innovation lab, management consultancy, or strategy firm. Our clients count on us to deliver on our promises of meaningful value, actionable insights, and tangible results. 

Founded and led by third-generation restaurateur, Aaron Allen, our team is comprised of experts with backgrounds in operations, marketing, finance, and business functions essential in a multi-unit operating environment.

How We Help

We bring practical, relevant experience ranging from the dish room to the boardroom and apply a holistic, integrated approach to strategic issues related to growth and expansion, performance optimization, and enterprise value enhancement.

Who We Serve

Working primarily with multi-brand, multinational organizations, our firm has helped clients on 6 continents, in 100 countries, collectively posting more than $200b in revenue, across 2,000+ engagements. 

We help executive teams bridge the gap between what’s happening inside and outside the business so they can find, size, and seize the greatest opportunities for their organizations.

• Strategic Advisory
• Growth & Expansion
• M&A Advisory
• Risk & Relevance
• Private Equity
• Future of Foodservice
• Middle East
• Due Diligence
• Aaron Allen

Quick Links

• How-To Restaurant
• Restaurant Innovation
• Alternative Foodservice Formats
• Restaurant Industry Trends
• Planning with Purpose
• Restaurant CEOs
• Casual Dining
• Menu Strategy
• Pressure-Test Your P&L
• Restaurant Due Diligence
• Brand Identity
• Restaurant Valuation Multiples
• Evolving CEO Priorities
• Restaurant Mergers & Acquisitions
• Restaurant Stocks
• Restaurant Board of Directors
• Industria de Restaurantes (en español)
• +1-312-701-3500
• Chicago, Illinois United States of America

Subscribe to our newsletter

© All rights reserved. Aaron Allen & Associates.

• Work With Us
• Copyright Policy
• Terms of Use
• Terms and Conditions

Red Lobster taps former P.F. Chang’s head as CEO in bankruptcy exit plan

A Red Lobster restaurant in Alexandria, Va., on May 20. Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

Damola Adamolekun, former CEO of P.F. Chang’s, will take the helm at Red Lobster after a court approval of the restaurant chain’s bankruptcy plan, investment management firm Fortress said on Monday.

Lenders, including Fortress Investment Group, are seeking approval for RL Investor Holdings, a newly formed entity, to acquire Red Lobster out of bankruptcy.

Adamolekun, who stepped down from his role as the boss of restaurant chain P.F. Chang’s in 2023, will become the CEO of RL Investor, Fortress said.

Red Lobster filed for bankruptcy in Florida in May with about $300-million in debt and a plan to close some restaurants and sell itself to its lenders or a higher bidder.

Red Lobster would continue to operate as an independent company, with 544 locations across 44 states in the U.S. and four Canadian provinces , Fortress said.

Report an editorial error

Report a technical issue

Follow related authors and topics

Authors and topics you follow will be added to your personal news feed in Following .

Interact with The Globe

• Updated Terms of Use
• New Privacy Policy
• Your Privacy Choices
• Closed Captioning Policy

Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by  Factset . Powered and implemented by  FactSet Digital Solutions .  Legal Statement .

This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2024 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. FAQ - New Privacy Policy

No tax on tips debate heats up as restaurant chef, server clash over how they're paid

Should tips be tax-free both front-of-house and back-of-house workers weigh in.

NY executive chef proposes eliminating the restaurant tipping system altogether

Cingari Family Markets executive chef Matt Alexander, a.k.a. 'Chef Nasty,' tells Fox News Digital why he believes customers would receive superior service if chefs and wait staff earned livable wages.

The 2024 election cycle has spurred another cultural uproar about tipping in the restaurant industry, and workers from the front and back-of-house want to make sure their takes on the debate are heard.

"It would be huge. But also, it goes both ways," New York tri-state area executive chef Matt Alexander, commonly known as "Chef Nasty," told Fox News Digital. "I do believe that we should just eliminate tipping entirely. I think that you would gain a superior experience if you were just to pay people a higher wage."

"I don't support that idea because I think that paying taxes is kind of what we do as American citizens," West Palm Beach-area server Olivia Kerwin also told Fox News Digital.

"So I don't think that just because someone makes their wage by being tipped means they shouldn't be taxed on their income, the same as anybody else would be in a different profession," she added. 

‘BAR RESCUE’ HOST JON TAFFER SAYS TRUMP'S TAX-FREE TIP PLEDGE IS ‘MASSIVE’

Both presidential nominees, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump, have publicly voiced their backing of a tax-free tips plan, which would end taxes on tipped wages.

Do restaurant chefs and wait staff feel differently about how tips should be taxed? ‘Chef Nasty,' or Matt Alexander, and Florida server Olivia Kerwin reveal their answers to Fox News Digital. (iStock)

Trump reportedly first announced the idea in June at a campaign stop in Nevada, while Harris announced during a campaign speech earlier this month – also in Nevada – that she wanted to do the same.

"It would definitely hurt you if you're working so hard for these tips, [then] you're getting taxed on it. But I believe that, for me personally and a lot of the other people in the back-of-house, if we're working our tails off, and we're being fully taxed, I believe they should be, too," Alexander said.

"I think the take home [pay] would be greater, but I think that it would be more of a short-term gain, because most people in the industry don't save their money properly," Kerwin responded.

"Speaking from personal experience… You get in the mindset of, ‘Oh, well, I made $200, $250, $300 tonight. I can go out and spend it on this, and then I'll just pick up a shift and make it back.’ And it becomes kind of like a vicious cycle."

Trump on his tax-free tips plan: 'Let them keep their money'

Former President Trump explains how he plans to not impose taxes on tips during the Republican National Convention.

Harris and Trump’s proposals, neither of which contain any details, are likely to be popular among those in the service industry. However, questions linger about whether they constitute good economic policy.

Nonpartisan policy group the Tax Foundation has estimated such a proposal would cost at least $10 billion annually and result in a $100 billion reduction in tax receipts over 10 years.

"I don't think we're going to be the superheroes here, that are going to get us to the next level where we need to go in terms of national debt. But I do feel that the wage needs to be higher," Alexander said.

"And it's becoming higher now in fast food especially, but in the typical, full-service restaurants, I think there needs to be definitely a change," he added. "With the cost of goods coming back down from what we saw there in COVID, I think that now is the opportunity to really turn the tables, so to speak, and get some new, fresh ideas going."

"Thinking about the big picture and thinking long-term," Kerwin countered, "I feel like even if my salary was increased because I wasn't being taxed on my tips, what about in the future?"

"If I'm not paying taxes, I wouldn't be able to collect Social Security? I wouldn't be able to get any kind of residual back for the taxes that I paid out based on my income for the following year, taxes-wise?" she posited. A LARGE MAJORITY OF CONSUMERS BELIEVE TIPPING CULTURE IS ‘OUT OF CONTROL’

Prior to his current role at Cingari Family Markets, Alexander graduated from the esteemed Johnson & Wales University culinary school to work and survive in the bellies of Michelin star beasts. But he feels the reason why high-caliber restaurants, like those now depicted in modern media hits like "The Bear" or "Burnt," don't offer livable wages is because "it all comes down to profits."

Kerwin transitioned from a full-time to part-time server earlier this year to pursue a new career opportunity. Now, only working one to two nights each week at an upscale steakhouse, she fears full-service restaurants are not able to offer an hourly rate that matches what’s currently earned by wait staff.

Larry Kudlow: If Kamala was going to exempt taxes on tips, she would have already done it

FOX Business host Larry Kudlow reacts to Vice President Kamala Harris adopting one of former President Trump's ideas on 'Kudlow.'

"I know that by putting forth the extra effort, and adding those little personal touches or taking extra good care and doing those little special things for people, it's going to increase my likelihood of making more money," she explained.

The best solution, according to the executive chef, who made an appearance on the Food Network, is to follow the fast food industry’s lead and pay every restaurant position a livable wage. He also pointed out misconceptions about pooled tips.

"Paying taxes is kind of what we do as American citizens." - Olivia Kerwin, West Palm Beach-area server

He told Fox News Digital he often employs this analogy: "there's always that person on the group project that got an ‘A,’ that never showed up to the meetings, never handed in an assignment and they're walking away with an ‘A.’"

"There's bussers, servers, there's other employees that need to be tipped out," Alexander added. "So your tip doesn't go 100% to the person that's actually giving you the table service… And a lot of places are weather-retaining or depend on a season… the cards can be stacked against you. There's a lot of variables. It's super variable. And I think that people don't realize that."

Kerwin echoed that there’s "room for improvement" within the restaurant industry’s pay-out structure, but for now, she feels the system works as it is.

GET FOX BUSINESS ON THE GO BY CLICKING HERE

Trump's tax-free tips proposal would be 'massive' for restaurants, servers: Jon Taffer

'Bar Rescue' host and executive producer Jon Taffer breaks down the impact of inflation and tax-free tips on the restaurant and food service industries.

"Tipping is optional. So sometimes, I've been stiffed. We've all been there," Kerwin added. "But I think that by having just a wage that you just knew you were going to get every single time that you went in, [it] is not going to incentivize servers to actually hustle the way that they do."

"This is people's livelihood, and not everyone has the privilege to be able to go to college or to do internships that open other doors… I think, just leave it alone."

READ MORE FROM FOX BUSINESS

THE 10 BEST Restaurants in Omsk Oblast

Restaurants in omsk oblast, establishment type, traveler rating, dietary restrictions, restaurant features, neighborhood.

• Skuratov Coffee
• Kolchak Restaurant
• Lapshichnaya with Little Flower in Big Window
• Cafe Berlin
• Mesto Pro Testo
• Sushi Master