What Is a Restaurant Closing Checklist?
A restaurant closing checklist for ensuring that your staff perform all tasks that are necessary for maintaining the orderliness and cleanliness of your restaurant. Opening and closing shifts are an important part of restaurant operations. There are numerous crucial tasks to get done, and having checklist can be helpful.
Systematic restaurant closing procedures for cleaning up the place before closing offers a variety of benefits to the community, employees, and owners. When your restaurant employees are efficient, your restaurant operations become smoother and hassle-free.
Being organized and tidy creates room for customers to enjoy a positive experience. It allows your employees to work without problems and end the day without too much stress. All of these contribute to better profits and reduced labor costs.
This article covers the following topics:
1. What are the benefits of a restaurant closing checklist procedures?
2. What to include in your restaurant closing checklist?
3. Discover all the advantages for restaurants closing checklist
What Are the Benefits of a Restaurant Closing Checklist Procedures?
Here are some of the key benefits of having a restaurant opening checklist and restaurant closing checklist in place:
Helpful Reminder
Smooth restaurant operations require each employee to work together to achieve a common goal. There are numerous tasks to do at a restaurant, and many team members are working together, but without a checklist, some of the tasks can be forgotten. A checklist can help make sure that all tasks are completed before closing.
Staff accountability
When you have a restaurant opening duties checklist, your employees know exactly what to do at the start of each day. The same is true if you use a restaurant closing checklist. You can hold your staff members accountable if one or more tasks are forgotten or not done properly.
You can assign the checklist to all of your staff members, or you can appoint one person to fill it out. Each person who completes their assigned tasks will sign their initials on the said task, so you will know who was responsible or not.
For example, if you notice that your restaurant runs out of inventory anytime Joey closes, then you can do something about it. You can perhaps train him on inventory management.Cost savings
A very crucial part of closing a restaurant after a long day is making sure all lights are turned off, and the heat and air conditioning are set to the right temperature. These may seem like simple tasks, but they can significantly reduce utility costs.
If you add these tasks to your checklist, they are more likely to get done. When your heating and air conditioning systems are used efficiently, your business can save a lot of money.
Increased safety
Another important part of a restaurant manager opening and closing checklist is locking up the restaurant. Other tasks that should not be absent in the checklist are turning off large appliances and arming the security system. A break-in or fire could not only lead to shocking expenses; they could also harm the lives of your staff and customers and end your business.
Now that you have a better understanding of the benefits you need to know what must be included in your checklist.
What to Include in Your Restaurant Closing Checklist?
You can group tasks in your checklist into the following categories:.
Cleaning
- Sanitize all surfaces including tables and chairs
- Flip chairs and place them on top of the tables
- Clean all floor mats, including those in the entryway and behind the bar
- Clear spills from the floor, under the grates, and behind the bar
- Sweep and mop the floor
- Replace floor mats
- Adjust the placement of tables and chairs in the dining area. Make sure tables and chairs aren’t in disarray
- Gather dirty cloths and dish towel
- Clean and sanitize menus, wine lists, check books, and anything that has been handled by the public
- Clean coffee and soda machines
- Sweep and mop the guest bathroom. Deep clean the toilet and refill toiletries if needed
- Empty all trash cans
- Wipe down the bar and sanitize the screens of tablets or point of sale devices
- Roll silverware
- Wipe and shine all glass surfaces
- Turn off all lights and appliances
Bar-Specific Tasks
- Put a date on newly-opened wine bottles
- Air dry all glasses
- Rinse the taps
- Wipe taps and spouts clean
- Cover spouts to keep insects out
- Restock canned and bottled beverages
Security
- Put away expensive alcohol and electronics in a locked cabinet
- Count cash in register drawers and store them securely
- Lock doors and cabinets
Organization
- Make sure all menus and wine lists are in their proper places
- Refill napkin dispensers
- Refill salt and pepper shakers
- Mary ketchups and check other condiments
Safety
- Set all refrigerators to 40°F
- Make sure no food is left in the open
- Keep sharp kitchen tools in their proper storage
- Turn off all ovens, gas stoves, and heaters
Tips for Implementing a Restaurant Closing Checklist
What’s the best way to make sure the checklist is properly implemented? Here are a few tips:
Brainstorm tasks
First, you need to figure out what tasks must be on your checklist. Observe your front of house, back of house, and management team as they work. Write down their routine tasks from opening to closing. Ask them which tasks must go to the opening checklist and which should be in the closing checklist. They will have valuable insights because they are the ones on the ground throughout the day.
Create your restaurant closing checklist
Using your notes from the brainstorming process, you can proceed to create your restaurant closing procedures. Place a checkbox or a space next to each item so your staff can sign and put a date and timestamp whenever they complete each task.
Share checklists with the team
If this will be your first time using the checklist, announce it to your team during an all-staff meeting. Explain the benefits of the checklist and how they should be using it. Communicate your expectations clearly so they will take this new requirement seriously.
Stay organized
Keep copies of the checklist in a folder in your office and make sure it is pinned in relevant areas every day.
Discover All the Advantages for Restaurants Closing Checklist
Gastronomy is exhausting and demanding. The mobile app from Lumiform, with its digital checklists for all areas in the restaurant, aims to make the work easier. The digital solution enables any quality and safety inspection simply by tablet or smartphone – online or offline. This saves time and money and also makes communication within the team easier.
The desktop software is used to create restaurant checklists in advance. Later, the data collected on-site is evaluated here. This significantly reduces the risk of quality losses, accidents, documentation errors, and damage to reputation. The straightforward operation offers no scope for errors by the inspectors. The app offers less complexity in documenting or filling out restaurant checklists than complicated paper or Excel lists.
Besides, food businesses profit in their daily business from the following further advantages:
- With the help of the flexible form builder, every individual paper list is converted into a digital restaurant checklist within a few minutes.
- Keep an overview of what is happening on-site at all times
- Via the super intuitive mobile application team colleagues can perform any check with ease and save time.
- Reports are created automatically – this saves the complete postprocessing.
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