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Shocking September for Hospitality

by | Oct 4, 2022 | Blogs, Sales Figures

Hospitality sales faltered last month with like-for-like turnover down by 6.9% versus the same period in 2021. The biggest contributor to this figure was food sales, which saw a drop of 12.7% this year.

London saw an increase of 8.9%, albeit, largely owing to a modest base point in 2021, when much of the Capital was still experiencing low footfall as a result of at-home working.

Richard Hartley, Chief Innovation Officer at S4labour, commented: “These are a sobering set of figures. This is the first significant indicator of a change in out-of-home eating and drinking habits and is a significant concern for our industry.”

48 Hours at Casual Dining

by | Sep 16, 2022 | Blogs, Hospitality

Casual Dining 2022. Coined the definitive event for publicans and restauranteurs. After exploring this labyrinth of 200+ incredible suppliers for two days, I’m compelled to say it lives up to the name.

Renowned for its keynotes from big names with invaluable industry insight, Casual Dining shares tales, tips and most notably, a projection of hope. Mark McCulloch, founder of Hospitality Rising UK, the biggest hospitality recruitment campaign going, delivered his drive to “Rise fast, work young.” The consensus amongst operators is that hospitality work is being treated as a stopgap and more needs to be done to attract and retain staff. Only 1/5 young adults consider hospitality as an option after leaving education, and only 2/5 employees in the sector would recommend it as a job. It’s clear there are a finite amount of people in the recruitment pool. Likening his idea for increasing recruitment to the shape of a hockey stick, Mark alluded to getting people into the industry at entry level, ensuring there are opportunities for them to rise quickly in the company. The more room there is for workers to rise, the higher the retention rate. Mark’s second point to ‘work young’ was not a reference to age, but rather a mindset. The idea is simple: be fresh in your approach to your business and your staff. Consider unconventional marketing ideas, increase your online presence, and save time and money by utilising the technological innovations in the industry. Lead according to the demands of your business and its staff, and not the blueprint from way back when. This modernising of the mindset is already happening. The CGA Business Leader Survey 2022 revealed that 47% of business leaders are planning to increase their investment in technology this year.

Alongside the discussion of growing the recruitment pool were talks of growing businesses. 38% of business leaders are actively looking into the option of business acquisition in the next 12 months, up by 20pp compared to Q1 last year. These figures are a testament to the industry’s perseverance, creativity, and passion.

To swim in a sea of incredible people, products and innovations for two days was certainly the highlight of my week. S4labour’s partners were out and about in full force; the team and I caught up with the folks at Zonal, Airship & Toggle, Tenzo, Apicbase, Tevalis and Vita Mojo. Having so many of the industry’s incredible minds in one room is a special occurrence, and one I hope to make more regular.

For S4labour, Casual Dining is and will continue to be one of the most important events of the year. As a company that is run by hospitality people for hospitality people, the opportunity to be face to face with operators is of paramount importance. Not only do these events remind business owners of the support we will give to them, but it reiterates to us how important our role is in supporting the industry.

It may have been my first time attending Casual Dining, but I certainly hope it won’t be my last.

Get to Grips With Your Daily Labour Spend

by | Jul 15, 2022 | Blogs, Hospitality

Following significant challenges over the last two years, hospitality is endeavouring to bounce back as restriction-free trading sees a new dawn for consumer demand. However, significant challenges are well documented, such as rising inflation, perilous utility costs and staff shortages, are already stuttering growth, as operators continue to navigate uncertain times.

According to a recent UKH, BBPA and BII member survey (May ’22), energy and the price of goods are first among the cost issues for members impacting margins. Furthermore 1 in 3 members are struggling to meet overheads or debts. Trade campaigning to reform business rates, training investment, access to people and a cut in VAT are being lobbied via targeted campaigns from our three main trade bodies.

The third factor negatively impacting margins is labour costs, an area which always has been and likely to remain operators’ highest variable cost. Indeed, people costs look to steadily increase due to legislation (National Minimum Wage/ Living Wage/ rising NI). However, labour is controlled differently across the industry – partly because hospitality is so diverse but also because knowledge, systems, training and management styles all vary across larger companies, multiple and single operators. This leaves an inconsistent approach and smaller multiple operators; leased, tenanted and single site operators seem to be missing out – generally the operators with the highest cost burden in relation to revenue.

Larger operators (bigger pub companies, well-known pub and restaurant brands) have managed their labour costs, historically by week and over recent years, daily, as part of their KPI’s. How much labour is invested each week is another conversation, with some operators keeping investment tight, others choosing to spend more, investing in service for more sales. Interestingly there’s evidence of increased labour investment (when operators have enough people in the first place) during this period of lower footfall for many but there’s a spend per head and premiumisation opportunity.

 S4labour enables single site operators, as well as larger multiples, to view their labour and revenue spend in-week via a till link, hence full visibility of labour costs – by day and by hour. Visibility of labour may prompt shift changes, moving hours to suit weather patterns, unexpected events or enables daily reaction to review sites (Google/ Trip Advisor etc) about service. The ability to move team hours around the rota, to suit trade fluctuations ensures ‘Slack’ hours (too many people) are re-scheduled to ensure minimal ‘Stress’ (not enough people) during service. Forecast till revenue helps guide the future, while reporting an accurate labour performance in the past – from previous days till data, previous weeks and against last year for a like-for-like view.

Bigger operators are using versions of this technology via their head office teams – now it’s time for multiples, leased, tenanted and Free Houses to have access to a labour tool which suits smaller businesses. A digital rota saves time – time which can then be used to manage people around service peaks and troughs, for more sales. Teams also like to view their shifts via a modern, simple app – with additional functionality to swap shifts if needed – it’s a modern, professional way of working with your teams and ready for all the new people that will hopefully be attracted to our industry.

S4labour are launching a campaign for operators to ‘Get to Grips with your daily labour spend’ – the 3rd highest but controllable cost. Operators currently spend time and investment controlling food and drink margin, food GP, drink yield and wastage – the industry is historically tuned to those areas. Spending a few minutes monitoring labour hours versus revenue and allocating accordingly is a much bigger prize. It’s also a data driven approach using site specific till data, while being really simple to implement and making a huge difference.

‘Smart tech’ should solve real problems, save time, or improve productivity – S4labour does all three:

  • Enabling daily visibility of labour – a large number of smaller operators generally manage a weekly rota and manage costs retrospectively, there’s now a solution for in-week labour cost visibility
  • Saves time via a digital rota,
  • Increases productivity via allocating hours to maximise service peaks and troughs, to maximise sales,
  • Forecasting becomes more accurate as more of the right people are in the right place for the right amount of time – all guided by operators’ own till data.

S4labour help sustainable businesses ensure longevity in these turbulent times – there’s no reason why smaller players shouldn’t be embracing the opportunity to ‘Get to Grips with your daily labour spend’ – to be on at least the same playing field as the bigger players.

May Experiences High Growth Rates for Hospitality

by | Jun 8, 2022 | Blogs, Sales Figures

Hospitality sales during May increased by 10% on 2021 levels.

Wet-led sales were up 16.5%, while dry-led sales were still up but by a smaller 4.5%.

Sites in London experienced high growth as sales improved by 30%; non-London based sites also saw a rise of 7% on May 2021 levels. London’s increase may be a result of restrictions in 2021 causing dampened sales, given there was limited outside space in London for hospitality sites.

It is important to note sales in May 2021 were during Covid-19. S4labour have ensured the data includes sites who could operate outdoors as well as indoors during May 2021.

Richard Hartley, Chief Innovation Officer at S4labour, said: “This last month has seen the struggles of staff shortages, inflation and energy costs continue to bring challenges for the sector. Although the increase for London is positive, the figures show just how much Covid-19 affected the Capital from a sales perspective.”

The Power of Integrated Hospitality Tech

by | Jun 8, 2022 | Blogs, Hospitality

The world of hospitality tech is vast. There is a seemingly never-ending list of technologies that can fit into our businesses to help do things “better” than before. Over the last 10 years we have been spoilt for choice. There are solutions out there for recruitment, rotas, communications and team engagement. Not to mention solutions for payroll, produce orders, tracking financials, marketing and customer engagement. Our tills have all become more automated, more accurate, and more compliant. You want a robot serving your guests, juggling dishes whilst telling jokes? Not a problem. We even have excellent data guys like Tenzo and Tahola that pull all the data we have stacked into our businesses into one place, giving clarity and visibility of all the benefits gained from this technical revolution.

Is all of this technology a good thing? Is it good for the customer and, critically, is it good for our businesses? Clearly every business is different. Even though I don’t see my local traditional Italian rolling out waiter bots or my independent watering hole taking on a business analytics suite just yet, there is a different mixture of hospitality tech that is the right fit for most of us. This will depend on the scale, style and priorities of the business. However, most businesses have come to understand that doing nothing will likely result in being less efficient, less productive and being left behind our competitors.

When looking at what tech is right for your business, one of the key places to start is by considering what your priorities are. Maybe it’s labour cost saving, growing sales, marketing, or a smooth EPoS system. As technology has become better and more critical to our industry, so has its consolidation. There have been some excellent innovations in hospitality that tackle the unique challenges we face. Yes, there’s still a significant amount of innovation and solutions being developed. We’ve also seen some giants of the technology service sector who can offer most operators pretty much everything – all under one roof as a multi-purpose tech supplier. You can now get your schedules, payroll, tills, F&B platform, analytics and more from just one supplier. This sounds like a positive thing for the industry: everything you need in one place and on one bill. Big tech has recently been on the acquisition trail, snapping up some of the best and brightest prospects in the hospitality tech world. In the last year, we have seen hospitality’s leading providers in training, compliance and ordering brought under the same roof as event booking and labour planning platforms in one big tech.

The question to consider is: can innovation, value for money, customer service or user flexibility ever be improved by the consolidation of tech? Unlikely. Innovation happens when specialists in their field are given the freedom to continually perfect the areas that they excel in. Customers benefit most when they can form close relationships with their suppliers, acting as the external voice that feeds into the product development.

The consolidated approach works well for those who want the mediocracy of everything. The under one roof offering tends to give operators one outstanding product, but a disappointing “everything else”. An operator can get one incredible piece of kit, but they’ll miss out on the best of everything else. Take Yapster for example: it’s brilliant and integrated with everything. If you want the best for team comms and leadership, go speak to Yapster. Yapster is an independent business with the best-in-class tech. Even though you could get a product from a consolidator, who can put team comms and EPos on the same invoice, there’s a sacrifice. You’ll likely end up with a weaker team comms platform in your business and a mediocre EPoS.

S4labour is 100% focused on being the best people system in the market. There is no other leadership, development or account management team more ingrained and experienced in hospitality productivity than S4labour. Over half of the winners at this years Publican Awards use S4labour, showing just how the best in the industry, who value the productivity of their teams above other tech, use S4labour. S4labour is also integrated with everything else in the category of market leading products. You can have the best people system, integrated with the best till systems, integrated with the best ATS, forward pay, training platform, marketing, comms, tipping etc and seamlessly link it all with S4labour.

By taking a sidestep around the “under one roof” consolidations, you will find a sea of the best of the best and you won’t need to compromise on any part of your technological priorities. The wonderful thing about everything that doesn’t sit with the consolidators, is just how well it all works together and how good we have all become at making the customer experience seamless and integrated with each other. Hedging your tech suppliers really is the only way to ensure you get an uncompromised solution.

April Sales Experience Growth Compared with Pre COVID-19 Levels

by | May 30, 2022 | Blogs, Sales Figures

Data from S4labour shows that hospitality sales during April increased by 3.7% on 2019 levels (pre-Covid-19).

Dry-led sales experienced the most growth with a 7% rise on 2019 levels; wet-led sales still grew but by a smaller 1%.

Sites outside of London were up 3.7% in sales last month, whilst London sites’ sales increased by a similar 3.5%.

Richard Hartley, S4labour’s Chief Innovation Officer, said: “The overall increase in April’s sales will have been a small positive for some food focused businesses. However, the ongoing difficulties surrounding recruitment is proving to be extremely challenging for the sector, and potentially stinting sales growth for some businesses.”