As partners to some of the most successful Australian restaurants, bars, cafes and more, the one common thread we’ve seen is their data-driven approach. Most of these businesses rely on their technology to provide them with data that enables them to drive revenue at a lower cost, and optimise operations.  This data shows-up in reports in central business intelligence platforms, in-built POS reports and even the easy and convenient mobile dashboard companion to Abacus POS.

Here are a few must-have reports and data every restaurant needs, along with actionable tips and examples of how to leverage them to drive profitable growth.

# 1: Identify revenue drivers with Sales Reports

Most operators start and end the day by checking their daily sales reports. Ideally, this flows directly from your POS system which acts as a single source of truth (and is one of the #1 reasons the best operators choose Abacus.

Daily Sales Tracking:
Daily sales reports are essential for tracking anomalies in sales patterns and providing cues to optimise or plan better. For example, if Mondays consistently show a dip in sales, you can plan a workaround by offering a “More on Monday” promo (ideally using your brand currency).

One of the reasons to keep an eye on sales is so you can reconcile this with “cash” received to check for any revenue leakage. Revenue leakage can happen for several reasons, including unrecorded transactions or incorrect discounts or surcharges. For instance, a cashier might forget to log a cash sale or an incorrect promotion setting in your POS might result in unintentional over-discounts.

Using your sales report to match recorded sales with the cash received, you can identify and address discrepancies. The cash register report on Liven Abacus POS makes this easier by highlighting any variance and including a breakdown of sales by payment method.

Pro Tip: With Liven Abacus POS, you can automate daily sales reports delivered straight to your inbox or quickly check with the Abacus Pocket BI app.

Your sales report on Liven Abacus POS also shows you other information, such as your top-selling and low-selling products. This helps you plan your production, find creative solutions to increase sales of your lowest-selling products or remove them from your menu entirely, increasing profitability.

Comparative Sales Analysis:
Top restaurants don’t stop at daily data— they compare week-to-week or year-over-year and use historical data to find patterns and leverage early promotions for high-demand periods. If you’re using an ordering system, such as Liven OrderUp, you can also use Category reporting to compare the performance of your menu categories. Year-over-year data is also useful for assessing the impact of holidays or marketing campaigns. 

For example, a restaurant that experiences spikes in July that coincide with sporting events may leverage game nights in general. They can then use event-specific promotions during game nights to boost revenue​​.

Pro Tip: If you have multiple venues, Abacus Business Intelligence also allows you to compare the performance of various venues. You can then use this information to learn from the success of high-performance venues and replicate it at lower-performing venues. Let’s say a multi-venue restaurant group in Sydney used Category Reporting with Abacus Business Intelligence to identify that "Cocktails" contributed 40% of sales at Venue A but only 15% at Venue B. By promoting signature cocktails and launching happy hour offers at Venue B, they can increase cocktail sales in no time.

#2: Inventory reports to cut costs without compromising quality

Food waste is still a significant cost sink for restaurants. However, while overordering can lead to food waste, underordering can lead to loss of profits. How do you find the balance?

Real-time inventory data:

This is where having a single technology platform (like Liven’s procurement & inventory management system Zeemart and Liven Abacus POS) provides you with a material advantage. When your procurement & inventory work seamlessly with your POS,  you will have visibility on real-time inventory. 

If you don’t have an inventory management system, your POS should still be able to provide some basic data, such as current stock levels and wastage tracking. For example, if your stock of burger patties is running low after a weekend rush, your POS should highlight this to help you restock immediately and prevent missed sales. 

Pro Tip: Liven’s Abacus POS updates inventory in real time and highlights anything below your safety stock threshold in red​​. It also records wastage and generates  COGS reports. By perusing these reports, you could discover, for example, that you consistently overstocked perishable ingredients for cocktails. Adjusting your ordering can help you save thousands annually.

Cost of goods sold (COGS) data:

Any inventory management tool, like Liven Zeemart, should also generate a COGS report. This data can reveal which menu items bring the most profit and what you sell at a loss. 

Using the COGS data on Liven Zeemart you can uncover whether over-portioning of high-cost items is eating into your profitability. By standardising portions, you can then reduce food costs and increase profits.

Pro Tip: Use advanced predictive analysis reports like theoretical COGS to predict costs for new menu items before launching them, which are available when you use Liven Abacus POS with Liven Zeemart.

#3 Managing your most important assets with Staff Reports

While you usually find the data you need in your staff management tool, your POS can help you view staff data with sales reports. This is another reason why having a consolidated tech stack like Liven One becomes essential, where the Liven Abacus POS system becomes your ultimate system of record and a single pane of glass through which you can view your venue operations. 

By using this data, you can see whether one shift outperforms another. This becomes your cue to evaluate whether it’s due to staffing, timing, or menu adjustments.

Pro Tip: Use the Staff Sales report on Liven Abacus POS to identify top sellers who consistently drive higher ticket averages. Pairing these high performers with newer staff can create a mentoring system that elevates the entire team.

#4 Building loyalty and engagement through Customer Insights

Understanding your customers can be the key to driving loyalty and profits. 

Customer Details and Order History:

Your Online Ordering system or POS should provide rich data on your customers and their order histories. You can use this information to gauge customer demand and make pricing or menu decisions accordingly. You can also use it to understand your audience better and launch engaging promotions.

Pro Tip: The export feature on Liven’s ordering system, OrderUp, allows you to identify customer patterns and take action. For example, say you identify regular customers who frequently order specialty coffees but rarely purchase food items. By introducing a promotion offering a free pastry, you can increase food sales among this segment and improve overall customer retention.

Centralising data:

Studying customer data from your POS or ordering system alongside your loyalty data can help you design better loyalty & engagement strategies. You can export different data sets from these systems and import them into spreadsheets or data visualisation tools to uncover patterns (better still, use Liven Insights).

Pro Tip: Liven Insights is Liven’s business intelligence solution that combines your sales, customer, and loyalty data into a single platform automagically. The visibility this provides equals endless benefits - for instance, Liven Insights might show that customers who redeemed your brand dollars typically spent more per visit than non-reward customers (hint: they do). It also shows you that your premium dishes (with high margins) were the least sold. You can combine these two insights to create a campaign positioning your premium dishes as limited-time “2X reward-eligible specials”. You can increase upsell revenue by publicising this promotion through your Magic App marketing and in-venue.

#5 Reports to benefit operational efficiency

Faster service enhances the customer experience and directly contributes to higher profitability by increasing table turnover and reducing labour costs. Service and prep time reports, usually available through POS extensions such as Kitchen Display Systems, can help identify bottlenecks and areas for improvement.

Pro Tip: Using Abacus’s Speed of Service and Preparation Time reports, you can identify whether prep times for a certain service are higher than others. For example, you might now know that your lunch rush preparation times are significantly longer than dinner times. You can consider pre-preparing certain ingredients or finding other ways to reduce lunch preparation time. This will increase table turnover and revenue during peak hours.

#6 Reports to benefit marketing efficiency

If you use marketing tools, they should help you measure the performance of your promotions. Use these insights to identify the most effective strategies and refine future campaigns. 

For instance, run an A/B test for two variations of an offer and use the data to determine which drives higher customer engagement and profitability. You can also use these insights to personalise your marketing—send tailored offers to customers based on their dining habits and preferences.

Pro Tip: You can use Liven Insights to identify super fans and target them with secret brand dollars and rewards.

You can also test different offers by running SMS or email campaigns, say one with a specific reward value and then another with a unique experience and a reward. Combining reports from Liven Engage and Liven Insights will enable you to see which performs better (SMS or email) and which offer leads to higher frequency visits and order values. 

Pro Tip+: Integrating POS and CRM data is the ultimate goal. Now, you can see lapsed or lagging customers - or a shift in their dining frequency - and instantly target them with offers to get them back in and enjoying your venue. That’s the benefit of a single integrated system like Liven One.

This year, it’s not just about having the tools but knowing how to use the data they offer to drive results - one insightful report at a time. 

If you need help setting up or using these reports on Liven products, contact us today!