Having owned and operated restaurants for the past 40 years, I have seen my share of scams, schemes and pitfalls—the kind any owner can fall victim to at the cost of a considerable amount of profit. These “situations” are at the out...

In a memorable scene from the 1967 movie “The Graduate,” Mr. McGuire offers a cryptic suggestion about the key to future for the young college grad played by Dustin Hoffman. Mr. McGuire: “I just want to say one word to you. Just one...

Managing and motivating the younger employee can be one of the most challenging situations a manager faces. How in the world do you get optimal performance from someone in the “younger generation” who may not seem to want to be motivated?...

• Consider many options. Such options include: selling the business to family members or trusted employees, selling to a third party or liquidation. • Begin planning early. The most successful planning starts five to 10 years before you wan...

Why bother with portion control? Well, do you like money? I do, and I like to keep as much of it as I can. Implementing a simple and concise portion-control program can literally save you tens of thousands of dollars! Tens of thousands of dollars tha...

Your grand opening is the BIG BANG of your business. Your opening marketing must be explosive enough, setting in motion the creation of your business. This is a golden marketing opportunity. Do the work. Business is not a ‘Field of Dreams.’ You m...

Pizza Tweets Pizzeria Lola @PizzeriaLola Pizzeria Lola is looking for a full time host. Could it be you–or that smart friend of yours? Send em our way: http:// bit.ly/Psgquk Why it works: Twitter isn’t just for posting your lunch specials. He...

Who and what is Gen Y? The sheer variety in this young workforce makes it difficult to define Generation Y. This group is so ambiguous that it doesn’t even have its own generational name. The popular expression merely morphed from Gen X to Y. T...

The pizza business is currently drifting in unchartered waters. The old model of making, baking and serving a praiseworthy pizza with a smile just isn’t enough to pay the bills anymore. What are we to do to prosper in the future? I’ve hea...

The kind of bankruptcy that a business files is not always the same and will require consultation with legal counsel to determine which filing makes the most sense. The five types of bankruptcy are: • Chapter 7. This applies to an individua...

Do you know exactly what it costs you to make each of your pizzas? If not, your price structure may not be as ideal as it should be. You can’t begin to calculate your food costs without understanding your ingredient costs. So the first step is ...

Even for pizza restaurants with a solid track record of success, it can be extremely difficult to obtain funding for growth. Why are lenders so skittish? Considering the industry’s over-saturation and its notoriously high failure rate, their re...