Menu costing, recipe pricing and menu engineering.

Every dish, mixed drink and no-prep item on your menu is costed off the prices already tracked in your inventory and ranked on what it earns, so you know what an item is worth before you change its price.

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Menu Recipe Builder

Build and cost your menu in one place.

An item's price, its cost, its recipe and what it sells in a week all live in one row. Every other page here is built on it, so when a delivery lands at a higher price the item using that product moves with it, instead of waiting for a recost at the end of a quarter. Already have a menu list? Drop it in, then build and cost out your recipes in a few simple steps.

Bar Cop Menu Builder
Menu Rundown

See which menu items are worth keeping.

A plain read on every dish and drink that you sell on the menu: what is working, what is not, and the move that follows, built from your costs and the units sold rather than from anybody's favorite. If you are attached to your menu items and recipes, this is where you get an unbiased opinion on if it is financially time to cut some menu items loose.

Bar Cop Menu Rundown
Menu Engineering

Stars, Plowhorses, Puzzles and Dogs.

Every priced menu item is sorted on how much it earns you and how well it sells, against the other items in its own category, and given the suggested pricing move plus the gained number behind it. So the thing you push hardest is not quietly the thing earning least. Price changes are logged and tracked with the date you made them.

Bar Cop Menu Engineering
Recipe Summary

Recipe costing from ingredient prices.

Every item with a recipe, costed off what its ingredients cost you today and ranked by cost percentage so the worst offenders sort to the top. Nothing to set up and nothing to edit. You open the recipe summary, see which items have moved in the wrong direction since you priced them, and start working with the items you want to change.

Bar Cop Recipe Summary
The Ninety Day Test

Test a slow item before you cut it.

A low-margin item that barely sells is not always a bad one. Sometimes it is a good one buried in a bad spot with a weak menu description. Move it, rewrite it, push it as a special, and Bar Cop watches it for ninety days against what it sells today, so cutting it or keeping it is a decision that can be made with before and after results.

Bar Cop Dog Test Tracker
Price Your Menu

Price your own menu.

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Straight Answers

Questions about pricing a menu.

What operators ask before they reprice anything.

Where do my menu item costs come from?
From the prices already on your inventory. Every item with a recipe is costed off what its ingredients actually cost you right now, so nothing is typed in twice and nothing is a guess. An item can also carry a cost you enter yourself if you would rather not build the recipe.
Does it update when a vendor raises a price?
Yes, on its own. When a delivery comes in at a higher price, every menu item using that product moves with it, and so does its margin. That is the difference between finding out the week it happens and finding out at the end of a quarter when somebody finally recosts the menu.
What is menu engineering?
It is sorting every item on your menu by two things at once: how much money it makes you and how well it sells. That gives four groups, usually called Stars, Plowhorses, Puzzles and Dogs, and each one has a different move attached to it. Bar Cop does the sorting off your real costs and your real units sold, and names the move.
Do I have to build recipes for everything?
No. An item can carry a cost you type in yourself, and a recipe is what lets Bar Cop keep that cost current for you as prices move. Build them where the money is, on the items you sell most of, and leave the rest until you want them.
What does it need before it will rank a category?
Four costed items in it. Below that you get a setup card instead of a ranking, because the groups are worked out against the other items in that same category and three of them cannot tell you much. It is a gate rather than a suggestion, and it will not invent a cost it does not have either.
Will it tell me what to charge?
It names the move and the number behind it, and you make the call. What it will not do is invent a cost it does not have or price something off a category it cannot measure, which is the difference between a suggestion you can check and one you have to take on trust.
Which items are costing me the most margin?
Every item with a recipe is costed off your live ingredient prices and ranked by cost percentage, worst first, so the ones eating your margin sort to the top. There is nothing to set up and nothing to edit on that page: you open it, see which items moved against you, and start with those.
How do I know a price change actually worked?
Every change is logged with the date, so you can look back at what you moved and read what happened to the volume afterwards instead of remembering it the way you would like to. The log is part of the pricing page rather than a separate chore.
What if a slow item is just in a bad spot on the menu?
That is what the ninety-day test is for. Move the item to a better position, rewrite the description, and Bar Cop takes its baseline from the units it sells now and watches it for ninety days. At the end you have a before and an after rather than an opinion about whether to cut it.
Can I price cocktails and food on the same menu?
Yes. Items are ranked against the others in their own category, so cocktails are judged against cocktails and food against food, and everything sits on one board. House-made syrups and mixes are costed once as a batch, and that cost flows into every drink and plate that uses them.