← All tips
Operations 2 min read Published 16 May 2026

The 11am stocktake habit that pays for itself in a week

A 10-minute mid-morning sweep of your top six SKUs catches the 2–5% gap that monthly stocktakes always miss.

Most venues do stock once a month and find a 2–5% gap they can’t explain. The fix isn’t a better spreadsheet — it’s a 10-minute mid-morning sweep of your highest-margin items, done by whoever opened the kitchen.

The six SKUs to track

  • Top three protein items by GP$
  • Highest-volume liquor pour
  • Most-stolen consumable (cling wrap, eggs, butter)
  • One ingredient that’s appeared on the wastage sheet twice this month

The format

One WhatsApp message per shift, sent at 11am: STOCK: ribeye 4kg | scotch 3kg | salmon 6kg | beer keg 12L | eggs 8doz | butter 4kg. That’s it. No spreadsheet, no sign-in, no app.

The conversation when it doesn’t add up

If the count is off by more than 10%, you don’t accuse — you ask. “Hey, I’m seeing salmon at 6kg this morning but the close last night had us at 9.2. Did we run a special I forgot about?” Nine times out of ten it’s a logged sale that didn’t ring through. The tenth time you find the leak.

More Operations tips

Operations

The section hand-over note that eliminates 90% of floor confusion

When sections change hands mid-service or between lunch and dinner, verbal handovers fail. A two-minute written note prevents every "I didn't know" moment.
Operations

When the restaurant is quiet, do the work nobody else does

Train, audit, plan, write. Quiet hours are not the problem — wasted quiet hours are.
Operations

The five-minute onboarding for first-time regulars

When a new face comes in twice in two weeks, do something specific. They become a regular for two years.