Memphis, Tennessee-based Cooper Hotels has figured out ways to save money while satisfying guests. By centralizing menu development, utilizing a core menu, helping chefs stick closely to pre-costed specifications, and employing cross-utilization from restaurants to banquets, the company, which operates hotels in seven states (mostly in the Southeast), has improved efficiency and consistency and shaved food costs across its system.

These improvements began two years ago when Cooper management gathered input from its chefs to create a database of highly profitable recipes and to create a core menu for both banquet service and restaurants at its properties, more than half of which are Hiltons or Hilton sub-brands. As a result, approximately 80 percent of Cooper’s menu items are now mandated.

“We brought our catering directors together in one place with their current menus,” says Brian Carney, Cooper’s corporate F&B director. “They told us what was and was not selling, plus what they thought would sell if they could get it on their menus.”

Implementation of the core menu and cross-utilization between catering and restaurants, along with continuous monitoring of unit food costs, have “allowed us to stay within food cost guidelines even through the spiraling costs we saw in 2008,” Carney says.

Andy Laubscher, Cooper’s corporate executive chef, estimates the company has shaved 10 to 20 percent off its food cost by going with the standardized core menu. He and Carney oversee culinary operations in 13 of Cooper’s 23 properties.

In redefining its banquet menus, Cooper management is emulating traditional dining room menus, Carney says, “which is a strong trend among higher-end hotel chains. In several instances, we were able to cross over menu items and ingredients from our upscale and mid-scale restaurants into our banquet menus.” The choices presented to meeting planners and booking parties are now “much more like the types of dishes they would order in our restaurants.”

Cross-utilization of menu items and ingredients from restaurants to banquets also helps Cooper maximize purchasing power and control product specifications. The result is higher and more consistent quality and improved product, pricing, and cost control. Thanks to the cross-utilization, Carney says, “We’ve managed to keep our food cost steady for the past two years.” It currently stands at around 32 percent.

Of the remaining 20 percent of [non-mandated] menu items, what is offered depends largely on the local market. A Hilton in Naples, Florida, with a Shula’s Steak House, for example, offers a high tea service with scones and tea sandwiches. In Tennessee, Carney says, “it invariably comes back to Southern fried chicken and barbecued ribs.” In other markets, management has added chef’s signature specialties such as bento boxes or vegetarian, gluten-free, and organic dishes.

MENU SPECIFICS
Cooper’s overall menu focus remains on mid-scale American cuisine, with chicken being the traditional number-one item. “The chicken might have different sauces on it, depending on whether it’s in Naples or Knoxville,” Carney says.

Included in the core menu are appetizers such as Petite Maryland Crabcakes with roasted red pepper aioli, Sesame-Crusted Chicken Skewers with Indonesian peanut sauce, and Coconut Fried Shrimp with orange marmalade. Entrées include Pasta Primavera served with grilled balsamic marinated vegetables, broccoli, penne pasta, and sliced grilled chicken; Seafood Ravioli with a butter cream sauce, green onions, and fine diced tomatoes; and Grilled Chicken Mac and Cheese with cheddar, American and goat cheeses, topped with sliced grilled chicken, fine diced bacon, and crushed croutons.

Plating specs for the core menu items are captured on recipe cards that feature the number of ounces of each ingredient, instructions for preparing the recipe, and a photo of the finished plate.

Laubscher has generated master recipes for preparing food items in volume for banquets. Additionally, he put together purchasing specifications that not only describe items but also show chefs how they are packed and, in most cases, include their Sysco order numbers for ease in electronic reordering.

Further, Laubscher provides daily food cost tracking sheets, which he says have been “very beneficial in showing chefs how their food costs are running on a daily basis.” It is, he concedes, “only a theoretical food cost” that fails to take inventory fluctuations and other factors into consideration, “but it gives a chef a good idea how he’s running. If he sees he’s a little high during the first 15 days of the month, he can take proactive measures to possibly correct that by the end of the month” by looking at purchases, waste, theft, and other factors.

Labor cost was “something we were good at,” Carney says, “but product cost was going all over the place.” Since beginning this program, which began in the restaurants, “we are more consistent, and our quality scores, compliments, and banquet evaluation scores have all gone up.”

Cooper had previously used a costing calculator but gave it up due to a fundamental problem. The manufacturer, worried that its program would be copied and distributed, programmed it in such a way that it could not be backed up. When a chef ’s computer crashed several years ago, it erased more than a thousand recipes that could not be retrieved. “We decided an Excel spreadsheet that can be backed up was a little simpler but more certain in the long run,” Carney says.

Future plans for the core menu include establishing an intranet, accessible to chefs at all Cooper properties, from which they can obtain recipes, plating specs, pictures of finished plates, and purchasing specs on an as-needed basis.

Howard Riell is a veteran editor who has written for nearly 140 business and consumer magazines, e-zines, blogs, newspapers, and newsletters. He is based in Las Vegas.