We came to the workshop last September and we didn't have very many systems in place. I think I shared a little bit yesterday that I had a lot of numbers and jumble here, there. I knew that when business was slow we needed to cut labor, I knew that we're supposed to have a food cost percentage and you're supposed to have a labor cost percentage and it's supposed to be under 65%.
I knew all that stuff, but I wasn't doing anything to make it happen except just trying. I didn't have anything to measure it with, so we came to the workshop and learned the systems. Labor was a nightmare. I mean everybody that we hired we were making them wash dishes before they would move to another position, because if they could get past the test of endurance then maybe they'd make it as a server or because we were just turning people over so bad.
Anyway, they wouldn't let me do that anymore after I left here, so we stopped doing that and we got the training in place. I literally couldn't leave the restaurant prior to coming in September, because it would just fall apart. It was insane, there was so much stuff in my brain and I would try to teach to do this or do that, but it was a by-the-minute. I would have call from the phone this is what you need to do right now kind of thing.
We had just hired a general manager, which didn't work out. He came to the workshop in September, but that only lasted a couple of months, because it just didn't work.
Anyway, we got all the systems in place, we got everybody to buy in at the restaurant and we're doing everything. One thing that I do is I personally is, of course, you've got to learn how to do it yourself first. Before you can teach it to somebody else you've got to know and you've got to be able to answer questions.
Anything that I implement I'll always do it first that way whenever the staff or a management has a question or resistance I have the answer. That's too much work or it's going to take longer or whatnot then I go no it's not I did it yesterday it took me 45 minutes kind of thing. There's nothing that they can shoot back at you if you've done it and you've proven that it works.
Long story short, back in February…we've been to two Champion Meetings; we're Champion Members. Whenever we came to the workshop I got the full-service training package, the management training package and I got the breakeven calculator as a bonus for signing up for the workshop.
Then we decided to join in the Champion Circle, because there is nothing better than the hot seat. It was a little bit painful sitting up there, because I was quite a bit mutilated. There's nothing better than hearing and sometimes you know what you're doing is not right, but you need somebody to tell you you're stupid that's just stupid and you don't need to do that anymore or either you're just doing it, because you don't know what else to do.
When you've got a room full of other people that are in the same shoes, because now that I'm kind of on the other side of the fence from where I was at in September, I'm hearing some of the same things going that's what I used to do, that's what I was like, that's how I was, so I still understand.
This past meeting in February, I called Renee two days before we were supposed to go to Phoenix and I was just boo-hooing and crying. We can't come, we don't have enough money, the checks are going to bounce and we can't come. She said you've got to come, you've got to come and you've got to figure out a way to come.
We went, we got there and I believe it's the turning point. It has changed the life of the restaurant and ultimately, our personal life. I no longer am in the restaurant 70-80 hours a week. I can't say that I don't still work that much, but I'm at home with my kids working.
I'll put my computer up and we'll have dinner. I can't remember the last time we've eaten dinner at our house on a night that the restaurant wasn't closed; we're closed on Sundays. We were eating dinner at home. I mean it might be 9:30-10:00 o'clock, but we're eating at our home and we haven't done that in three years.
At the Champion Meeting is where we went through our numbers, we looked at everything and that's where we determined the breakeven point for the restaurant. I knew how to use the breakeven calculator, because I'd been using it doing the systems, but it was actually one sentence that Fred said while we were sitting in that meeting and I went I haven't done that.
I popped up my computer, I punched in some stuff and I went I'm so stupid, we needed to close for lunch forever ago. My mentality had been you know we're losing money like crazy, so if I'm open and I've got 10 customers walking in the door I need that $100 bucks to pay I don't know, whatever, the pest control man. What I didn't look at was I'm bringing in $100, but my labor cost some days at lunch was 76% and my labor cost at dinner was $14.
It turned out there was a $2,500 difference being open for lunch, being open for dinner and I don't know if I ever would have figured that out on my own. Even though you get all the systems, you get all of the templates, the worksheets and all of that stuff; you know I had all the stuff.
This last time whenever I've done my coaching call with David I was like okay I'm doing this, I'm doing that, everything still feels like it's thrown from here to the next 30 miles. It's like I've got to print 75 sheets of paper to figure out where I'm at today, so he helped me get it even more organized and it's some simple spreadsheets now, which I get excited over little stuff like that, because I'm a geek.
Anyway, I was just so excited when I got off the phone, because now I can go in and I can punch in this number and things that were taking me literally hours to do, especially the old schedule and the way I used to do the schedule; it was horrible. It would take me like two days to do the schedule, because it was like putting a puzzle together and I was doing it based on everybody else's schedule Suzie's in class on Wednesday, so and so is.
One day I had this revelation and I went you know what, these are the shifts that I need and if you can't work these shifts then I don't need you. I started hiring people to fit my schedule instead of trying to work my schedule around them and now I can do the schedule in under an hour. I know how much money I'm spending, where everybody is going and if they don't like it I'm sorry this is what my business needs.
I was always running it more about I need you, but this is my business, this is what it needs and I'm sorry that you go to school. That was just February, the meeting was in February and we closed for lunch March 1st, because I do everything immediately, so this was like February 22nd at the meeting. I came back, I told the staff March 1st we're closing for lunch; we're not open for lunch anymore.
Anyway, we were down 5% in sales last month after deducting what we usually make for lunch, but we broke even for the first time ever last month.