Stone & Lever Consulting

Grow Your Food Business Without Sacrificing Quality

We help you increase sales, keep your best sellers in stock, reduce food waste, and get more production from the people you already employ.

You grow sales, reduce food waste, and improve your profit margins.

Built for restaurants, cafés, bakeries, quick-service concepts, dessert shops, and food-service groups.

Make More Money From the Food You Already Sell

We compare what you charge for each menu item with your ingredient costs and the time your staff needs to prepare and serve it. We account for your sales mix so you can see which items contribute the most profit, where your pricing needs to change, and where you can reduce costs.

You keep more profit from your existing menu after paying for food and labor.

Plan Your Purchasing and Staffing Around Expected Sales

We use your sales history and product mix to forecast what you will sell and when. We compare your forecasts with actual sales to measure how much they overestimate or underestimate demand. We use those numbers to plan your orders and labor budgets, with stock levels that account for your forecast’s margin of error.

You prepare for busy periods, spend less during slower ones, and make fewer last-minute purchasing and staffing decisions.

Keep Your Best Sellers in Stock

We utilize ordering systems that tell your managers what, how much, and when to buy based on your sales forecasts, inventory on hand, and delivery schedule.

You reduce stockouts, fill more orders, and keep less cash tied up in excess inventory.

Cut Food Waste and Keep More Profit

We help you reduce how much food you buy but never sell. We account for your inventory’s expiration dates and how much you expect to sell before it expires when setting stock levels and order quantities.

You throw away less food and keep more money from the sales you already make.

Get More From the People You Already Pay

We figure out how many orders your kitchen and service staff can handle and create production and staffing targets by role, shift, and order volume. We use those targets to schedule your staff around customer demand. This often means you can serve more customers with the people you already employ, so you spend less to make more.

Your team serves more customers before you add another employee, and you hire in time to keep growing without sacrificing food or service quality.

Get Better Results From Your Staff

We define the core functions of each role in your business and spell out exactly what each person is responsible for. We draw clear lines between your kitchen, customer-facing staff, and managers so your employees know who handles purchasing, inventory counts, preparation, orders, and customer problems. We create SOPs for your daily processes, set measurable standards for each role, and train your managers to compare actual performance against those standards and provide feedback in real time.

Your employees will have clear expectations, your managers will manage staff based on data, and your business will serve more customers with fewer mistakes.

Keep Sales Coming In During Slower Periods

We help you identify what your customers still buy during slower days and seasons, then shift your offers and marketing toward the products you can keep selling. More sales during slower periods give your trained employees more productive hours and reduce the pressure to lay them off until business picks back up.

You keep more of your team together, keep cash coming in, and start your busy season ready to grow instead of rebuilding your staff.

Get More Sales From the Marketing You Already Pay For

We track which campaigns produce customer orders, how much revenue those orders generate, and how each channel performs over time. Then we test one change at a time and measure the results before changing anything else. We use those results to put more of your budget behind the offers and channels that produce profitable sales.

Your marketing produces more orders and more revenue per dollar.

Increase How Much Customers Spend With Each Order

We train your staff to sell the add-ons, upgrades, and combinations your business already offers as part of each order. We track your average ticket and sales mix so you can see which offers increase customer spending and how much profit those additional sales produce.

Your customers place larger orders, and you earn more profit from each sale.

Keep More Customers Coming Back

We set clear standards for order accuracy, wait times, and resolving customer problems so your team delivers the service your customers expect on every visit. We also help you use loyalty programs and memberships to encourage repeat purchases and train your staff to enroll customers as part of the sale.

You get more return visits and more sales from customers you already paid to acquire.

Get More 5-Star Reviews

We help your team deliver the customer experience you expect and build a simple process for requesting reviews after a visit or order.

More 5-star reviews give new customers more reasons to choose your restaurant, so your marketing produces more sales.

Hire Better People

We help you make better hiring decisions by teaching you and your managers how to interview candidates. We teach you how to use open-ended questions, structured follow-ups, and specific prompts to understand how someone communicates with customers and coworkers, follows procedures, handles a busy shift, and responds when something goes wrong. We also provide interview questions, decision trees, and follow-up prompts your managers can use when a candidate’s answer raises a concern or deserves a deeper look.

You spend less time hiring and replacing people and get more production from every person you hire.

Enjoy Being an Owner

By the end of our engagement, fewer day-to-day decisions will need your attention and involvement. You can focus on growing your business, spend time with your family, or leave knowing your managers and staff can run the next shift without you directing every step.

Your time in your business becomes a choice, not a requirement.

I'm ready to grow