How to run a restaurant stock count properly

A restaurant stock count is the least glamorous hour in the kitchen's week and one of the most important. Almost every number that matters about food depends on it. Food cost percentage is calculated from it. Par levels are checked against it. Waste shows up in the difference between it and what the recipes say should have been used. If the count is wrong, every one of those numbers is wrong too, and decisions get made on a story that is not true.

Most counts go wrong in predictable ways. They happen at the wrong moment, while deliveries are arriving or prep is under way. The count sheet is in alphabetical order, so counters walk back and forth across the stores. Units change from week to week. One tired person does the whole thing alone at midnight. Partly used containers are guessed. Nobody checks the result against last time before it is entered.

This guide sets out a stock count routine that takes about an hour in a typical restaurant and produces a number you can trust. It covers when to count, how to prepare, how to lay out the count sheet, how to protect stock count accuracy, how to value the stock, and a stocktake checklist you can print. It also covers how often to count, and what to do differently when you run more than one venue.

It helps to understand the failures before designing the routine, because each step below exists to prevent one of them.

Every one of these makes the count less accurate, and most of them make it look better than it is, because missed stock is more common than double-counted stock.

The count needs to happen at a moment when nothing is moving. For most restaurants, that is after the last service of the period has closed and before the first delivery or prep of the next. Late at night after close, or very early in the morning before deliveries, are the usual choices.

Whatever time you choose, keep it the same every period. The count defines the boundary between one period and the next, and sales and purchases have to be cut off at exactly the same moment. A count taken on Sunday night after close pairs with sales up to Sunday close and deliveries accepted up to Sunday. A delivery that arrives on Monday morning belongs to the next period, even if its invoice is dated earlier. Our guide on how to calculate food cost percentage explains why this cut-off matters so much to the final figure.

Ten minutes of preparation saves half an hour of counting and removes most of the errors.

The single biggest improvement most kitchens can make is to reorder their count sheet. An alphabetical sheet sends counters back and forth across the stores: anchovies in the dry store, apples in the walk-in, aubergines in the fridge, and back again. A sheet in shelf order lets them start at the door, work round the room, and finish without doubling back.

Lay out the count sheet by location, then by shelf, then left to right along each shelf, exactly as the stock sits. Group the sheet into zones: walk-in, reach-in fridges, freezers, dry store, bar, and the line. Within each zone, list items in the order a counter will meet them. When the storage layout changes, change the sheet the same day.

Each line on the count sheet needs the same columns:

Decide once how each item is counted and never change it without changing the sheet. Bottles or litres, cases or each, kilos or grams. The unit on the count sheet should match the unit the stock is valued in, so the count converts directly into money without a conversion step where mistakes creep in.

Stock count accuracy comes from method, not effort. These practices make the biggest difference.

Two people count faster and more accurately than one. One counts, the other writes. The writer reads back each number as it is recorded, which catches slips immediately. Pairs also make it much harder for anyone to adjust a count, deliberately or otherwise.

If the same people count the same zone every week, they start counting what they expect to find rather than what is there. Rotating zones between pairs every so often keeps the count fresh and catches long-standing errors.

Partly used containers are where estimates hide. For dry goods and liquids, weigh the container and subtract the tare weight, or measure the level against marked fill lines. For spirits and wines, count in tenths of a bottle or weigh. Never write "half" for an item that is clearly a third full, because those small errors add up across a store.

Prepared items, such as sauces, stocks, portioned proteins and chopped vegetables, are stock too. Either count them at the value of their ingredients, or agree a simple rule that prepared items are counted as their raw ingredients. What matters is consistency, so the same item is treated the same way every period.

Once the count starts, no stock comes in or goes out. If something must be used, record it and adjust. Stock that moves mid-count is stock that gets counted twice or not at all.

Once quantities are counted, each line needs a value. There are several methods of stock valuation, and the right one is the one you apply consistently.

For most restaurants, last purchase price is accurate enough and easy to maintain. Whichever you choose, use it every period. Changing valuation method between periods moves the stock value, and therefore food cost, without anything changing in the kitchen. The general accounting idea of stocktaking applies to restaurants just as it does to shops: the method matters less than applying it the same way every time.

Print this and keep it with the count sheets. It covers the routine in order.

The tenth step is the one most often skipped, and it is the one that catches the most errors. If a line has moved far more than usual since last time, recount it before accepting the number. A missed case of butter is much cheaper to find the next morning than at the end of the month.

Here is an illustrative time budget for a sixty-cover restaurant with two counters per zone and three zones. It shows that a full count does not need a full shift.

The count takes about an hour from start to finish, because the zones are counted in parallel and the sheets follow the room. The same count done by one person with an alphabetical sheet could easily take three.

The bar deserves its own zone and its own method, because it holds a lot of value in a small space and most of it sits in open containers. Count unopened bottles and cases in whole units. Count open bottles in tenths, either by eye against a consistent reference or, better, by weighing them and subtracting the empty bottle weight. Weighing takes a little longer to set up and is far more accurate, especially for spirits poured by eye.

Keep the cellar or back store separate from the working bar on the sheet. Stock moves from the cellar to the bar every day, and if both are lumped together the count tells you nothing about where a shortfall happened. Count kegs by weight or by the meter, if you have one, rather than by guessing how full they feel. Our guide to bar inventory management covers the bar count in detail.

Sometimes a count throws up a number that does not make sense: a line that has dropped far more than usual, or a total stock value that has jumped. Resist the urge to explain it away or to accept it. Work through it in order.

Most surprises are resolved by the first three steps, which is why it is worth doing them before raising the issue with the team. A kitchen that is questioned about food that turns out to be a counting error quickly stops trusting the count.

The best counts mix knowledge and independence. Someone who knows the stores well, usually a chef or the person who orders, understands where everything lives and what each item looks like. Someone less involved in the daily ordering brings fresh eyes and makes it harder for long-standing errors to survive. Pair them, and rotate the pairs over time.

Make the count part of the rota rather than an extra task at the end of a long shift. People count carefully when they have been given the time to do it, and carelessly when they are counting on their way out of the door.

A full count every month is the minimum, because that is when the accounts close. Many kitchens also count weekly, which makes problems visible far sooner.

A practical compromise for busy venues is a full count at the end of each month and a spot count of the twenty most valuable lines every week. Those lines usually carry most of the money, so a change in them shows up quickly. If a spot count shows something unexpected, a full count of that zone follows. Whatever rhythm you choose, keep it fixed, because a count done the same way each time is worth far more than a slightly more thorough one done differently.

With several venues, count on the same night everywhere. If one venue counts on Sunday and another on Monday, stock transferred between them on Monday is counted twice or not at all, and neither venue's food cost means anything. Use the same count sheet layout, the same units and the same valuation method in every venue, so the results can be compared.

Record every transfer between venues at both ends, with the date and the value. A case of wine borrowed from one site by another, unrecorded, makes the lender look careless and the borrower look efficient, and the conversation that follows is usually about the wrong problem.

The count is only useful if it feeds decisions. Use the closing stock value to calculate cost of goods sold and food cost percentage. Compare counted quantities with par levels to place the next order; our guide to par levels explains how. And if you have costed recipes, compare actual usage with theoretical usage to see where food went, as explained in our guide to actual vs theoretical food cost.

A count feels like a chore when it is long, late and pointless. It feels like part of the job when it is short, scheduled and visibly used. Keep it to the hour by preparing properly and counting in parallel. Put it on the rota, at the same time every period, so nobody is surprised. And share what it shows: when the count reveals that waste fell or that a supplier was short-delivering, tell the team. People take care over a job when they can see that it matters.

Counting shelves is a physical job, done in the stores with a sheet or a tablet. Where servearound helps is with the other half of the numbers the count feeds.

The sales figure for a period has to cover exactly the same stretch of time as the count. In servearound, orders, checks and payments are recorded as the service runs, on the venue's own clock, and the reports in Analytics can be read for any range you choose, so the sales side of food cost lines up with the moment you counted. The menu report shows how many of each dish sold in that period, which is what you need to work out theoretical usage. If you would like to see it, get in touch.

The head chef should be involved, but it helps if they are not the only counter. A second person, rotated regularly, keeps the count independent and catches errors the chef may not notice in their own kitchen.

Yes, if the tablet sheet follows the same shelf order and units. A tablet avoids the separate entry step, which removes one common source of errors. Make sure it saves as you go, so a flat battery does not lose the count.

Count them if you track them, but keep them separate from food. Mixing them into the food count distorts food cost.

Recount the lines involved before drawing conclusions. If the recount confirms it, check deliveries, transfers and credits for the period before looking at waste or loss.

Count them as part of the stock if they belong to you at the cut-off. A separate line on the sheet for each off-site location stops them being forgotten.

Count it, then remove it and record it as waste in the same period. Leaving expired stock on the shelf inflates the closing value and pushes the loss into a later month, where it will look like a problem that happened then rather than now.

For high-volume or high-value kitchens, often yes. For most, a monthly full count with weekly spot counts of the top lines gives most of the benefit for much less time.

To run a restaurant stock count properly, count at a fixed moment when nothing is moving, prepare the stores first, use a count sheet in shelf order with one unit per line, count in pairs, weigh or measure partial containers, include prep and work in progress, value stock consistently, and compare the result with last time before accepting it.

Kept to an hour and done the same way every period, the count becomes the most reliable number in the kitchen, and every other number about food gets better because of it.