Almost every penny of profit that is driven to the bottom line starts as revenue from someone ordering a menu item.  Prices and popularity of your menu items determine how much of this revenue makes it to the bottom line, and how much is absorbed by operating costs.  This spreadsheet enables you to compare which items have the best profit margin (menu price - food cost), as well as which items have the best contribution profit (profit margin X number of items sold).  Using this information, you can determine which items you may want to consider removing from the menu, which items you should position in prime spots to increase sales, and which items need some thought regarding how to make them more profitable or more popular.

While this version of the Menu Engineering Spreadsheet is more compatible with all versions of excel, it does have slightly less functionality because the visual basic macros have been removed.  To download the version with the macros, click here.