Gone were the days of relying on clunky spreadsheets and guesswork to know the cost of a recipe.  Produce helps you increase your margins by allowing you to not only view but also fine tune recipe costs and GP%. 

Use the recipe cost calculator to see how much it costs to prepare a batch (e.g. marinara sauce) or a made-to-order dish (e.g. lasagne). Easily see the cost per batch, per unit, and per ingredient. Experiment with ingredient quantities, ingredient alternatives, and pricing changes - then instantly see how it impacts your GP%.

This guide covers how to access the recipe cost calculator.

What’s in this guide?

Before you begin
Recipe types that have the cost calculator
Accessing the calculator + parts 
Frequently Asked Question

Before you begin

You would need:

• Produce enabled with the Advanced Recipes or Advanced Prep plan
• Stock items (e.g. flour), batch items (e.g. dough), & sold items (e.g. pizza) added as products in Back Office
• Recipes created in Produce 

Recipe types that have the cost calculator

The recipe cost calculator can be used to finetune ANY recipe type. Whether you’d need to look at the cost of each sold item or each batch. 

1. Made-to-order products - these are items that you sell that are usually prepared after they’ve been ordered. (e.g. pizza, lasagne, cocktail)

2. Items prepared in batches but are NOT SOLD - these are items that you prepare in-house usually as an ingredient for a made-to-order product. (e.g. pizza dough, marinara sauce) 

3. Items prepared in batches but are SOLD INDIVIDUALLY - these are items prepared in bulk then served individually. Usually, baked goods or beverages fall under this classification. (e.g. croissants, iced tea, spaghetti)

Note - to learn more on how to set up these recipes, check out our guide on creating recipes.

Accessing the calculator + parts

1. Once you’re on the Recipes tab, select the recipe you’d like to view.

2. You will be taken to the recipe where you will also see fields reflecting the cost and GP%.

These fields are slightly different for batch recipes and made-to-order recipes and are affected by other fields in the recipe. Refer to the image and notes below:

Costs, Gross Profit & your Sell Price:

• Cost - This is the cost for each ingredient depending on the quantity used and the cost price of the stock item. The cost price is based on Back Office / Purchase data /  Produce data and is updated in real-time. 
  
  • Note - any difference in unit of measure for the stock items (e.g. 2kg flour) and the quantity used in the recipe (e.g. 5g) are calculated automatically in the background.
    
• Unit Cost - This is the Total Cost divided by the Expected Yield. This is only seen in batch recipes.
  
  
• Total Cost - This is the sum of all ingredient costs.
  
  
• Gross Profit - Even if you are looking at a batch recipe, this field shows the GP% for the individual product/unit. This is derived from [the sell price minus the unit cost] divided by [the sell price] multiplied by [100%].
  
  • Note - While you can edit the Gross Profit field to see a Suggested Sell Price, this will not be saved. Cost prices need to be edited in Back Office with the required Permissions.
    
    
• Sell Price - This is taken from the company price set in Back Office.
  
  • Note - this does not take Price Lists into account for now.
  • While you can edit the Sell Price to see a potential Gross Profit, this will not be saved. Cost prices need to be edited in Back Office with the required Permissions.
    
    Sell prices and gross profit are only seen in items that you’ve indicated in Back Office as items that you sell.
    
    
    

Fields that will affect costs:

• Expected yield - If you are looking at a batch recipe, the number entered as the expected yield will affect the Unit Cost. (as mentioned above)
• (Ingredient) Quantity - This changes the cost for the affected ingredient as well as the Total Cost.

3. Once you are happy with any changes to the recipe, simply select Save recipe on the upper right corner of the screen.

Frequently Asked Question

What does it mean that the cost price for ingredients is based on Back Office &  Purchase data?

Lightspeed will check if an ingredient has a Recipe Cost (from Produce). If there is no recipe, Lightspeed will get the Average Cost Price (from Purchase). And if there is no Average Cost Price, the Fixed Cost Price (from Back Office) will be used.

The Fixed Cost Price is entered as a product detail in Back Office. But if you use Purchase and Produce, you will be able to get a more accurate figure for ingredient costs. Here’s how:

• For ingredients that you buy (e.g. Flour 1kg) = Average Cost Price is used
  
  • Once you start using Purchase to buy the flour, any recorded cost price changes within 30 days will be used to calculate the Average Cost Price.
• For ingredients that you prepare (e.g. Pizza dough you prepare in-store) = Recipe Cost Price is used
  
  • Once you create a recipe for the pizza dough on Produce, this sets up its Recipe Cost Price. This cost price takes the Average Cost Prices of the ingredients (e.g the flour used in the pizza dough) & their quantities into account.

Note - you can learn more about pricing hierarchy in this separate guide on cost of goods.

What's my next step?

Use Produce to streamline your kitchen prep. Check out our guide on scheduling and tracking prep with Lightspeed Produce.