ClearCOGS Blog
Restaurant Food Cost Quiz: 8 Questions Every GM Should Get Right
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Eight questions on restaurant food cost and waste. Every answer comes from a government report …
How to Forecast Restaurant Sales for the Holiday Season: 7 Checks
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS To forecast restaurant sales for the holiday season, stop treating November and December as one …
The Order Is Typed Twice: A 90-Minute Teardown of One Manual Order Cycle
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Here is one Monday order cycle in a full-service kitchen, taken apart minute by minute. …
Menu Prices Are Up 3.5%. Grocery Prices Are Up 1.8%. Five Beliefs, Checked Against the Data
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Restaurant menu prices rose 3.5% in the 12 months to September 2026. Grocery prices rose …
How to Build a Restaurant Prep Sheet (Free Template)
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Quick answer: A restaurant prep sheet should list each item, the unit you make it …
When Should a Manager Override the Forecast?
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Quick answer: A manager should override a recommended prep or order quantity only when they …
2026 Food Costs: What’s Rising, by How Much, and What You Still Control
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Quick answer: Restaurant ingredient costs are moving unevenly in 2026. USDA’s September outlook forecasts wholesale …
Visibility Is a Brand Standard
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Every franchise system has a list of things a franchisee cannot change. The recipe. The …
You Cannot Make Half a Batch
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Quick Answer: A forecast can predict demand to a decimal point. A kitchen produces in …
Prep Hours and Line Hours Are Not the Same
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Quick Answer: Almost no restaurant knows how long its prep actually takes. Back-of-house hours are …
The Last Batch Decides Your Waste
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Quick Answer: The final batch of the day should be sized to the demand remaining …
Ordering to Be Safe Is Still a Guess
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Somewhere in most restaurant groups this month, a leader will open a purchasing report, see …
Setting It Up Was Never the Hard Part
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Plenty of restaurant groups have set up an inventory and recipe system properly. A surprising …
Three a Day Is Harder to Forecast Than Three Hundred
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS An operator running a growing group in a smaller market described her problem to me …
Your Sales History Isn’t Your Demand History
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Quick Answer: No, they are not the same thing. Your point of sale records what …
The Guest Count Is Only Half the Answer
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS A server once came to my table after a youth soccer game and whispered, in …
You’re Not Ordering for Next Week
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Quick Answer: A weekly order almost never covers seven days. It has to cover the …
The Lunch Rush Is Won at 9am
By Matt Wampler, CEO of ClearCOGS Almost every business case for prep forecasting gets built on the cost side. Less waste, …
