The following guide will take you from having a blank MarketMan account to fully using the system on a day-to-day basis!
Each step below is hyperlinked with corresponding articles to help you along the way. If you need anything at all please reach out to us at support@marketman.com.
1. Connecting your POS
- Check out the POS systems that we integrate with! Then please reach out to your Customer Success Manager or support@marketman.com to get started!
- Once your POS is connected, all the menu items and sales will flow in automatically!
- We don't sync with your POS? - no worries! You can upload your sales.
When you upload your daily sales, any new menu items you have sold will be added automatically as well.
2. Building recipes
- You should work in groups- it's easier to control and get value off your work when you're focusing on "just the drinks" or "just breakfast" every time.
You can also use the menu profitability report to prioritize your work- you should probably start with your best sellers, the items with the most quantity sold. - Just like in real life, where we're starting by collecting the ingredients we need for the making of a dish, you should start by setting up your sub-recipes and preparations.
- As you are building your recipes, you might notice that duplicate items come up. In that case, you will want to merge them!
Items most likely have duplicates because you buy them in different sizes, from different suppliers, or the product code has changed. - Once we sorted out all of our ingredients - time to cook! Let's build the menu!
While you're doing this, you can add food cost alerts, so you know when the menu items are exceeding your desired goals. - If your recipe requires an ingredient that you buy in EA/Weight but you measure in Cups, Tbsp, Tsp, you can convert its UOM for the recipe!
- For all types of recipes, make sure to add in photos, prep/cook time, and instructions about the recipe. All this will flow into the cookbook, which you can access on the app, tablet, or computer. Great tool for training your staff and keeping track of all recipes!
You can add images of the measuring tools you want kitchen staff to use while prepping an item.
You can even add a link to youtube if there's an item with a sophisticated plating / process. - If you are using preparations, you will be able to manage your batch productions in MarketMan!
When you make a batch of one of your bulk recipes, you want to record this as a production event. This will increase your on hand of that batch item, and deplete the corresponding ingredients.
Preparation items have their own lines on the actual VS theoretical report; they're basically an inventory item you make in-house! - If you're creating a production list before the actual event happens, you'll be able to manage the jobs in the kitchen easily. You can create production events with specific names to help move things around in the kitchen before you even get in.
3. Reporting and monitoring costs
- Once you have a category built out with recipes, (don't forget the modifiers! "add lettuce" is part of your "burgers" category)
Check out the menu profitability report regularly.
Use categories and the sorting options to analyze this report:
- Which items are my best sellers?
- Which are the most profitable (in many cases, not the same items!)
- In each category, which item is the most expensive/non-profitable?
- Which items are the most profitable? - push those in specials, employee meals, and happy hour! - The recipe pricing is live - meaning, when the price of an item is changing, the cost of the recipe will change as well. To keep your recipes up to date, make sure you're handling all of your prices on the Irregular Prices Report, and that you're merging items when needed.
The "main" purchase option in a merged item will be the cost for recipes. Which is why we always recommend keeping the most-purchased item as "main". This way, the price tracking will be updating the most, to reflect in the recipes as well. - You can add food cost alerts for some (or all) recipes.
An email will be sent to manager users when the costing reaches the percentage limit.