If you have ever wondered why restaraunts buy their food in bulk, then here are the reasons why in this article. There are more than one reason why restaurants do this, but of course, for some foods there is a limit to how much they can store of certain types of foods that they will buy. This is dependent on the type of food and the restaurant’s storage capacity. Both of these can effect how much food a restaurant can buy at one time.
The more perishable the food is, the less the restaurant may buy at a time, unless the food item they are buying in bulk sells a lot and goes pretty quickly. This leads to the first reason why restaurants buy their food in bulk:
Reason #1: Restaurants buy food in bulk so that they don’t run out of food.
Running out of food is one of the main things that a restaurant dreads happening. If a restaurant runs out of food, then it means that they may lose future customers that might return to eat again, because they don’t have what the customer wants whenever they order from the restaurant. This means a loss of profit for the restaurant at the moment when the customer is ordering food, and a potential loss of steady profit in the long run.
We have witnessed this happen on multiple occasions from working in various different types of restaurants. Some guests will not be satisfied with just anything on a restaurant’s menu, but only go to a restaurant to buy certain food items that they really like. If the restaurant doesn’t have that certain food item in stock, then they will immediately leave the restaurant, as it was the only reason they came to the restaurant to begin with.
For this reason restaurants may buy a certain food item in bulk, as it is not uncommon for specific foods at a restaurant to sell a lot more than majority of the food items available on their menu.
Reason #2: Restaurants buy food in bulk so that they can make all or most of their food dishes.
Also, restaraunts will sometimes even make all of their dishes from one food item. This is also not an uncommon thing, as restaurants do not have the capacity or labor to easily make a large variety of different foods. For example, a restaurant that makes pasta dishes may buy a lot of cheese and dry noodles in bulk. A burger restaurant may also buy a lot of burger buns and ground beef. A chicken restaurant may purchase literal tons of chicken a week.
Restaurants don’t have the room in their kitchens to have all the equipment in their establishments to make every single type of food there is. So, they typically stick with only cooking a certain type of food and buying the necessary ingredients to make them in bulk. This is why the first reason mentioned earlier is so important. The restaurant can’t afford to run out of food, else they may not be able to make majority of the good items on their menu.
Reason #3: Restaurants buy food in bulk sometimes for future special orders.
Sometimes restaurants will buy certain food items in bulk for future orders that they were told about, or special events that happen yearly. During certain seasons, restaurants keep tabs on last year’s sales to forsee when they may have to buy more food than normal for the same time that year. If a restaurant knows that last year they ran out of a certain food item, because of events that happen yearly, then they will buy food in bulk beforehand to be ready again and try to prevent it from happening again.
It also isn’t uncommon for certain types of restaurants to do catering orders. This could be for schools, weddings, or other local businesses that have big gatherings planned on certain days. Usually a restaurant will be told about these things by these businesses days or even weeks beforehand. This gives the restaurant enough time to prepare for it by buying extra food in bulk.
These businesses typically will order 30 to 300 orders all at once, or even more. The larger the order, the more food the restaurant may buy in bulk to make sure that after preparing, cooking, and delivering that order, they still have food to be able to make for their regular guests that come in during the usual business hours. If a restaurant were to order (buy in bulk) their usual amount of food when things like this happen, then they may run out of food, which would be pretty embarrassing. Imagine having to tell a guest that your chicken restaurant has no chicken. So, to prevent this, they buy their food in bulk more than the usual as necessary to keep things running smoothly.
Reason #4: Restaurants buy food in bulk to save money and increase profit.
Restaurants will also buy their food in bulk to save money, as food usually bought in bulk is cheaper. Since, many foods are perishable, buying these foods in bulk takes some stress off of the companies that sell them to the restaurants. If these companies that sell their food in bulk end up having to throw away food because it spoiled before it could sell, then it means a loss in potential profit for that company.
Companies will often sell food in bulk that is only available to restaurants at a lower price to increase their own profit. This benefits the restaurant and the company selling the food to them as well. The company won’t have to throw away food before it perishes and can’t be sold, so it is a win win for the company selling the food in bulk to the restaurants and the restaurant too, because they got it at bulk price.
Restaurants don’t mind buying these foods in bulk like this, since they probably will run through all the food they just bought in only a few days, long before it would have perished. It is usually better and cheaper for them than if they were to have gone to local grocery stores to buy what they needed on a daily basis.
