A single outbreak of a foodborne illness in your restaurant could cost you millions of dollars according to new research.

Regardless of the size of your establishment, one foodborne outbreak can lead to millions of dollars in lost revenue, fines, lawsuits, legal fees, insurance premium increases, inspection costs and staff retraining.

The findings, based on computer simulations by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and published online in the journal Public Health Reports, are a sombre reminder of the need to assess the food safety and outbreak prevention measures in your restaurant.

Invest in your staff

Taking the time to train all your staff in proper food safety and infection control procedures can save you money in the long run.

Proper hand washing stations, food handling rules and cleaning protocols can greatly reduce or eliminate the risk from contagious foodborne pathogens like listeria, hepatitis A, salmonella, E. coliand norovirus.

And ensuring your staff have access to sufficient sick leave policies will also greatly reduce the risk of your restaurant passing along any illnesses to your customers.

Inventory Management

Simple but effective inventory management best practices are other key ways to reduce your risk of serving foodborne illnesses and losing millions of dollars in profit.

Implement an organized system for proper storage, labelling, handling and usage of all your orders to keep your food fresh, your customers safe, and your food waste to a minimum.

Using the right tools for inputting and tracking your inventory data will make this job easier and more successful. Choosing an inventory management software system designed just for the restaurant industry and your retail inventory control will allow you to easily and accurately keep track of your stock between staff, restaurants and suppliers.

Accurate Ordering

To reduce your risk of a foodborne illness, and cut down on wasted food, you also need to accurately monitor what food is perishing on a weekly basis.

Over-purchasing fresh produce, dairy and meats is an easy – and costly – mistake to make if your inventory system is not managed effectively. When you own a restaurant, you never want to run out of fresh food, but having too much inventory is equally bad for business.

Refining your purchasing and inventory management to only what is required and reducing the extra non-essentials will help protect your customers and your profits. Professional inventory management software makes this job a breeze.

Prep Appropriately

Over-prepping in your kitchen can be a significant drain on profit. And it can put your restaurant at a higher risk of introducing a foodborne illness.

Over-prepping – when too much food is prepared ahead of time for your menu items each day – creates waste and spoilage. Using inventory management software like Optimum Control can help you easily and accurately calculate required prep and optimize prep amounts based on shelf life.

Reducing waste and time spent on unnecessary prep will help minimize your risks for foodborne illness and maximize your profits.

Inventory Management Software

You can take control of your risk for foodborne illness and profit loss with professional inventory management. For maximum impact, move beyond tedious paper records and digital spreadsheets – today’s best tool for the food and beverage industry is inventory management software.

Optimum Control offers you complete, streamlined restaurant management and retail inventory control software solutions for businesses of all sizes. Our range of easy-to-use software will help you effectively reduce food spoilage, take control of your inventory, save money, calculate recipe costs, reduce unnecessary staff hours, boost productivity and maximize profits.

Take control with Optimum Control! Contact us to learn more about our full suite of restaurant management solutions.