At the moment, it is quite difficult for catering firms to make money. They, like many other businesses, are being squeezed from several different directions.
Many of their traditional customers have less money in their pocket, so are not as able to pay as much for a meal, or an event. They expect more for their money than they ever did before.
At the same time, most caterers are finding that their overheads are soaring. The cost of fuel and energy are both rising, as is the cost of raw materials and equipment.
The only way to compete effectively is to offer better value for money. This means cutting costs, which is difficult when your overheads are rising. However, there are still areas where costs can be reduced to provide the wiggle room a catering firm needs to keep what they charge their customers down.
Bringing Staffing Costs under Control
For most catering firms staffing is a big cost. Wages, national insurance, uniforms and sick pay all mean that employing staff is expensive. If you can get your staffing costs down, it is surprising how much you can save.
There are several ways to do this. Firstly, check your staffing levels on a regular basis. If you find you have periods of time where people do not have much to do consider changing their shift patterns, or even cutting their hours. Alternatively, change their duties slightly to give them things to do during what would normally be un-productive time for them.
It is important to make your staff as flexible as possible. You may wish to cut your core staff, and employ more people on an adhoc basis.
Sourcing the Right Staff
Modern recruitment techniques actually make this viable. Using a good recruitment website that specialises in finding people for the catering industry is key. If you use the right website, you can advertise your posts and receive applications from properly qualified staff within just a few hours. If you move quickly and ask the right questions you can find the people you need, and get them working at very short notice.
Catering recruitment with www.caterer.com makes it easy to quickly find the staff you need. This very experienced catering recruitment website provides an inexpensive recruitment service.
