Menu Margin Analyst
Finds the popular dish that is losing you money
6 dishes cost more than 30% of their price; repricing them to target is worth $9,233.
12 dishes, $53.8K revenue, $35.4K contribution; food cost 34.1% against a 30% target.
Stars: House burger, Steak frites, Grilled salmon. They carry the menu: protect their quality and position.
Puzzles (good margin, few orders): Lamb shank, Seafood platter. Plowhorses (popular, thin margin): Margherita pizza, Chicken pasta, Fish and chips.
Labour, waste and how demand reacts to a price change are not in the data; the repricing figure assumes the same portions sold.
Portions by menu class
- Star30%
- Plowhorse56%
- Puzzle5%
- Dog9%
Food cost % by dish
- Seafood platter53.8%
- Steak frites41.5%
- Fish and chips40.7%
- Grilled salmon40%
- House burger31.7%
- Chicken pasta31.1%
- Lamb shank30%
- Veggie bowl27.8%
- Caesar salad27.6%
- Margherita pizza25.8%
- Tiramisu25.3%
- Soup of the day22.9%
Menu engineering
| Dish | Price | Food cost | Sold | Contribution | Class |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| House burger | $15 | 31.7% | 620 | $6,138 | Star |
| Margherita pizza | $12 | 25.8% | 540 | $4,806 | Plowhorse |
| Chicken pasta | $14 | 31.1% | 480 | $4,464 | Plowhorse |
| Fish and chips | $15 | 40.7% | 410 | $3,649 | Plowhorse |
| Steak frites | $26 | 41.5% | 240 | $3,648 | Star |
| Grilled salmon | $21 | 40% | 260 | $3,276 | Star |
| Caesar salad | $11 | 27.6% | 330 | $2,508 | Plowhorse |
| Lamb shank | $24 | 30% | 110 | $1,848 | Puzzle |
| Tiramisu | $8 | 25.3% | 300 | $1,680 | Plowhorse |
| Veggie bowl | $12 | 27.8% | 150 | $1,245 | Dog |
| Seafood platter | $29 | 53.8% | 90 | $1,206 | Puzzle |
| Soup of the day | $7 | 22.9% | 180 | $972 | Dog |
Reprice to target
| Dish | Price now | Price at target | Gain |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steak frites | $26 | $36 | $2,400 |
| Fish and chips | $15 | $20 | $2,187 |
| Seafood platter | $29 | $52 | $2,070 |
| Grilled salmon | $21 | $28 | $1,820 |
| House burger | $15 | $15 | $517 |
| Chicken pasta | $14 | $14 | $240 |
What to do this week
- Reprice or re-cost Steak frites, Fish and chips, Seafood platter: they are the furthest above target.
- Promote Lamb shank, Seafood platter: good margin but few orders, so each extra order is worth more.
- Rework the portion or recipe of Margherita pizza, Chicken pasta, Fish and chips: they sell well but earn little per plate.
Do
- Change one thing at a time (price, portion or position) so you can see what moved sales.
Don't
- Don't drop a dog on margin alone: check whether it brings guests who order other dishes.
How to improve
- Add labour minutes per dish so the next report can rank by contribution after labour.
- Add sales by month so the next report can separate seasonal dishes from weak ones.
Demo
Overview
Restaurant profitability is decided by the menu, and almost nobody analyses the menu properly. The operator knows which dishes sell — the till says so daily — and has a rough sense of food cost. What they do not have is both numbers together, per dish, kept current as ingredient prices move.
Put popularity and margin on the same page and the menu splits into four groups, each needing a different action. A dish that sells well and earns well should be protected and made easier to find. One that sells well and earns badly is the dangerous one — busy, feels successful, and quietly the reason the month was flat. One that earns well and sells rarely is a placement and description problem, the cheapest fix in the building. One that does neither is occupying menu space, fridge space and prep time.
What makes it genuinely hard is that recipe costs are calculated once, when the dish is created, and never again. A dish costed at 28% two years ago can be at 41% today and nothing in the business would ever say so.
This agent recosts each dish against current prices, classifies the menu, and quantifies what each change is worth at current volumes. It sets no prices and removes no dish: both are decisions about your guests and your reputation, and neither is arithmetic.
Benefits
Margin found without raising a price
Most of it is portioning, waste and recipe drift.
The menu earns its space
Every dish justified by what it contributes.
You stop being busy and flat
Which is the most demoralising way to run a kitchen.
What it does
Recosts against today's prices
Recipe costs are set once when a dish is created and never revisited. A dish costed at 28% can be at 41% and nothing would ever say so.
Popularity and margin together
Separately, both are already known. Together, the menu splits into four groups with four different actions.
Finds the busy dish that loses money
The dangerous one. It feels successful, and it is why the month was flat.
Reports contribution, not percentage
A 78% margin on a side is worth less than 62% on a main. Percentages decide wrongly and everyone uses them.
Prices each change at current volume
What fixing this dish is worth per month, so the effort goes where the money is.
Sets no prices
A price is a decision about your guests and your position. It gives you the arithmetic behind it.
What this changes
What this changes about your week
- It takes over
- Recosting every dish and putting margin next to popularity.
- Done today by
- The owner, once, when the menu was written.
- How often
- Should be monthly. Is almost never.
- Typical manual effort
- Every recipe recosted against current ingredient prices, then multiplied by actual covers.
Why Restaurants & Food Service in particular. Recipe costs are calculated once and never again. A dish costed at 28% can be at 41% today and nothing in the business would say so — and it is usually a best seller.
Runs unattended
Started by you or by an event, and it finishes on its own. Nothing waits for someone to be at a desk.
The same standard every time
The two-hundredth item is held to the bar the first one was. Consistency is the part people cannot sustain.
It cannot act on its own
Menu Margin Analyst has no path to sending, spending or committing. That limit is why its output is safe to act on.
How it runs
This agent runs server-side through the PROMIVO runtime. Each run is logged step by step and every tool call is permission-checked before it executes.
- 1InputValidated against the agent input schema
- 2Modelclaude-sonnet-5 with automatic fallback
- 3Toolsextract_structured_data
- 4PermissionsRuns READ actions automatically; anything higher waits for approval
- 5OutputStructured result matching the output schema
- 6LoggingTokens, duration and every step recorded
Requirements
Integrations
No integrations required.
Before you start
- Dishes with selling price and recipe
- Current ingredient costs
- Sales counts by dish for the period
- Waste records, where you keep them
- Requires the Starter plan or higher
Use cases
Menu redesign
Which dishes earn their place, before it is printed.
After supplier price rises
Which dishes moved, and by how much.
Seasonal changeover
What the last season actually earned, dish by dish.
A flat month with good covers
Usually a menu-mix problem rather than a volume one.
Pricing
Starter
Billed monthly through your PROMIVO subscription. Cancel at any time.
Runs consume your plan allowance for agent executions and tokens. See plan limits
FAQ
Will it change prices or remove dishes?
No. Both are decisions about your guests, your reputation and your positioning. It gives you the numbers and what each option is worth.
Do we need exact recipe costs?
It uses what you have. Where a recipe is incomplete it reports the dish as partly costed rather than estimating around the gap — an invented ingredient cost would be the most quotable number in the report and the least reliable.
Does it account for waste?
Where you record it, yes, and it is often the finding. Where you do not, it says the cost is theoretical rather than actual — the gap between the two is usually where the missing margin is.
Reviews
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