Mirus Reporter

Restaurant sales and customer traffic have been in decline for months, and July didn't help. While the results were not the worst in recent history, July extends several streaks that started at the start of 2016. Same store sales for July fell (1.2%) on (2.6%) less traffic. July was the first month this year that recorded negative growth in both numbers.

Restaurant organizations are increasingly turning to data to help manage their operations more effectively, improve marketing, drive revenues, increase profit margins, ensure competitiveness and grow their businesses. Unfortunately, today, the most widely implemented solutions aren’t Business Intelligence (BI) or Business Analytics (BA) solutions. No, today, the vast majority of restaurant companies rely on reports generated by the very systems used to operate (POS, BOH, etc.), their businesses.

Why? In my humble opinion, there’s a lot of confusion around terms being used to describe what any restaurant company may be receiving when it comes to their reporting. There’s Above Store Reporting (ASR), BI and BA to name a few. While they each provide a means to an end, that end is very different in each case.

What is a Restaurant Reporting Dashboard?

In layman’s terms, a dashboard is a user interface that, to some extent, is similar to an automobile's dashboard. It organizes and presents information in a way that is easy to see and understand. A dashboard is a graphic presentation of the most important data needed to accomplish a number of objectives all combined on a single screen.

A restaurant business can obtain information from any system that contains data (the Point of Sale system, a Back Office system that contains labor and inventory information, guest loyalty, accounting, etc.) and then combine it all to present all the data as though it came from the same source. The goal is to integrate information from numerous systems into a unified presentation in order to gain greater access and a deeper understanding of the business.