No Reservations: The Honest Guide to Restaurant Success
Aug 5, 2026 · 23 min · 10 segments
What numbers should every restaurant owner know? In this episode, Kasey Anton breaks down the core financial metrics that drive every successful restaurant. From Prime Cost and labor to occupancy and…
Casey AntonHost
Right? So number one, now that I say that I could think of a few different ways to look at this, but let's start with your number one prime costs.
They make up the majority of the amount of money that leaves your bank accounts and prime costs are food and beverage costs.
Now,
let me, let me, I'm going to back up a second because in my head, when I'm talking about this, I'm visualizing the way my profit first for restaurant system works, right? Which is, starts with all the money that gets deposited into your income account.
Those are just big fat, hopefully fat, deposits, whether they're from your point of sale, from Stripe.
If you happen to collect a lot of cash, hopefully you're depositing it in the bank, at least enough to pay your bills, right? That goes in your income account.
But that's not all your money, right? We have sales tax, also known as meals tax, not your money.
So that should be immediately moved out of that bank account and put into a separate account that is titled sales or meals tax.
And that is not me being, um, you know, standing on a high horse and trying to be ethical and all that careless, throw ethics out the window.
So the best thing that you could do for yourself is to move it out of that account and put it in its own designated sales and meals tax account so that you do not ever get in trouble.
There is never, and I've been doing this for a very long time, 20 years, with spark almost when I was like 18 plus.
Right? So number one, now that I say that I could think of a few different ways to look at this, but let's start with your number one prime costs.
They make up the majority of the amount of money that leaves your bank accounts and prime costs are food and beverage costs.
Now,
let me, let me, I'm going to back up a second because in my head, when I'm talking about this, I'm visualizing the way my profit first for restaurant system works, right? Which is, starts with all the money that gets deposited into your income account.
Those are just big fat, hopefully fat, deposits, whether they're from your point of sale, from Stripe.
If you happen to collect a lot of cash, hopefully you're depositing it in the bank, at least enough to pay your bills, right? That goes in your income account.
But that's not all your money, right? We have sales tax, also known as meals tax, not your money.
So that should be immediately moved out of that bank account and put into a separate account that is titled sales or meals tax.
And that is not me being, um, you know, standing on a high horse and trying to be ethical and all that careless, throw ethics out the window.
So the best thing that you could do for yourself is to move it out of that account and put it in its own designated sales and meals tax account so that you do not ever get in trouble.
There is never, and I've been doing this for a very long time, 20 years, with spark almost when I was like 18 plus.
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