Menu Item Pricing Calculator, Australia

Industry benchmarks: cafes 18% to 25%, casual restaurants 28% to 32%, fine dining 30% to 35%, cocktails 18% to 22%, wine 35% to 40%, beer 25% to 30%. Lower food cost % = higher gross profit, but also higher pricing, which can hurt volume. Most successful menus have a mix: 'star' items at favourable food cost (the items you push), 'plowhorse' items at higher food cost that drive volume.

Base rate × (1 + super % + workers comp % + leave loading + super on leave). For a Level 4 cook on ~$30/hour base, the loaded rate is typically $39 to $45/hour after 12% super + ~4% workers comp + 25% leave & loading equivalents. Always use loaded wage in pricing, using base wage under-costs labour by 30% to 45%.

Usually not in Australia, GST applies to both dine-in and takeaway at the same 10% rate. The only legitimate reason to price differently is service-related, e.g., a public-holiday surcharge applies only to dine-in service, not takeaway. Some venues offer a small takeaway discount to incentivise pickup over delivery (which carries 30%+ aggregator fees).

It's a planning tool, not a P&L. The food cost and labour inputs are the most accurate parts, those come from your actual recipe and roster. Overhead allocation is harder, it depends on your actual rent, utilities, and admin costs. Use the calculator to set the menu, then track actual food cost % and labour % weekly against the model. Variances above ±3% are worth investigating.

Both arrive at the same answer mathematically, but operators think differently about them. Food-cost % method: 'I want food cost to be 30% of price, so price = cost ÷ 0.30'. Multiplier method: 'My multiplier is 3.33×, so price = cost × 3.33'. For a $3 ingredient cost, both give $10 menu price. Choose whichever framing your kitchen team finds intuitive.

Price each item separately. Averaging is the classic margin leak in hospitality, high-margin items subsidising low-margin items invisibly. Cost each recipe individually, set its price for its food cost %, then look at the menu as a whole to ensure your blended food cost stays on target (typically achieved through menu engineering, promoting the stars, deprioritising the dogs).