OPERATIONS Lean and Mean The right and wrong ways to reduce costs By Mike Bausch Photo Josh Keown T imes will get tough. When your bank account is dwindling because revenue has decreased, the next task becomes cutting costs. It's a decision riddled with failure points. The goal is to cut costs without slicing your nose to spite your face. Any cost-cutting decision should be for the greatest good of the restaurant based on the wisest decision, not the quickest or easiest. Getting shifty on your taxes, loose with payroll, and destroying your menu program will cut costs, but it will send your restaurant into peril. Another foolish decision is to cut marketing as a knee jerk reaction for the first thing to go. The smarter decision is to reduce any marketing without return on investment (ROI). This evaluation requires you to evaluate all aspects of each marketing campaign to see which ones have ROI worth investing in. Yes, when times are tough, you need to invest in marketing. You can't harvest crops without planting seeds, and you can't dig your way out of a hole with a shovel. 3 4 / P I Z Z AT O D AY. C O M / J U LY 2 0 2 0 034_PIZ_0720_OPcuttingcost.indd 34 6/9/20 10:05 AMhttp://www.PIZZATODAY.COM