The dish that sells little and earns little: review it
You've got a dish on the menu you barely order stock for, it sells a handful of times each week and when you work out the margin it doesn't make you smile. Drop it? Raise the price? Swap out an expensive ingredient? Most people guess, or leave it alone because changing feels risky when you don't know what'll happen.
How to tell if the problem is price, food cost or nobody ordering it
Start with food cost: what the ingredients cost you, divided by the selling price. If you sell a dish for £12 and the ingredients cost £7, your food cost is 7 ÷ 12 = 0.58 (58%).That's a thin margin for most small kitchens.
Second, sales: if you sell it three times a week, you're missing opportunity and probably binning ingredients that go off.
The trap: changing both price and recipe at once, then not knowing which one worked.
The method: a fourteen-day test that compares before and after
Pricora calculates food cost for every dish (recipe + ingredients + price) and crosses sales with margin. When it spots a dish that sells little and has low margin, it shows you a recommendation on your dashboard with a confidence level ("why"). You decide: accept, postpone or dismiss.
If you accept, you start a test for about fourteen days. Pricora compares sales, margin and waste before and after your change. Nothing is changed automatically; you adjust the price or recipe, Pricora measures. When the evidence is too weak, it shows nothing rather than guessing.
What you do today vs. what it looks like in one place
| Today | In Pricora |
|---|---|
| Calculate food cost in Excel or your head | Food cost per dish, updated with each purchase |
| Check sales on the till, remember what you binned | Sales + margin + waste, crossed by dish |
| Change price or recipe, wait and see | Fourteen-day test, before/after comparison |
| Three spreadsheets, two notebooks, memory | One dashboard, one recommendation with confidence |
Common questions
Is this only for restaurants?
No. It works for bars, cafés, street food, event catering, home kitchens selling to order and weekend market stalls. If you cost recipes and sell dishes, it fits.
Does Pricora change prices automatically?
No. It recommends, you decide. Nothing is touched without your approval.
What if I sell very little and the data is thin?
When the evidence is weak, Pricora shows no recommendation. It would rather stay quiet than guess.
Start with one dish
Pick the dish that bothers you most: thin margin, few sales, you always wonder. Work out its food cost today (ingredients ÷ selling price), write down how many times you sold it this week and how much you binned. Change one thing (price or one expensive ingredient), wait two weeks, count again. That's a test.
Pricora does it in one place and crosses the numbers for you. Try Pricora and stop guessing.