What is it?… How’s it work?… What’s it cost?… FAQs. We know you have lots of questions about what the RFI is and isn’t. We’ve tried to answer them all here. And if we missed one… just reach out.
The Restaurant Food Index is the restaurant industry’s first guide to prices restaurants are paying for their supplies. It provides a national and local view on price trends on over 100 of the most popular ingredients purchased by restaurants. The RFI tracks each ingredient and shows low, high and average price ranges for each ingredient. The RFI is compiled from data on hundreds of thousands of real monthly supplier purchases in the United States.
It’s like the Consumer Price Index, but for restaurants.
All the data used to compile the Restaurant Food Index is based on real restaurant supplier purchases.
The RFI looks at hundreds of thousands of transactions to build the indexed ingredients.
For an ingredient to be included, it must have a minimum of 20 purchases from 20 different suppliers at 20 different restaurants in the last two-week period.
What this means is that the RFI analyzes a massive data set to deliver ingredient price trends with statistical relevance.
Of course not. The RFI is not designed to be a price list for suppliers. The RFI is designed to track the real prices that are being paid at a local and national level for supplies. The RFI does not show individual supplier prices. Rather, the RFI shows the low, high and average prices actually paid on over 100 of the most common ingredients.
The index tracks low, high, and average prices on over 100 of the most common supplier ingredients.
For each item covered, there is a national pricing chart and local pricing chart.
Each chart shows the highest 25%, the lowest 25%, and the middle 50% of prices being paid.
These ranges are for real supplier purchases made within the last two-week period.
With the Orderly app, price charts can be tracked against your specific purchases. The mobile app shows both the national and local price ranges plotted against your purchase prices.
Food costs represent 1/3 of the operating budget of most restaurants. Managing food costs through better purchasing can be a key determinant to your restaurant’s success.
Every restaurant should manage its top 20 – 40 ingredients by dollar volume and ensure that it is receiving fair pricing on these ingredients. Acumen in the area of food costs and pricing plays a crucial role in the financial success of the restaurant.
The RFI will give you supplier price data that’s never been available to restaurants before – the actual prices other restaurants are paying.
You can use this information to manage and negotiate better prices for your ingredients so you’ll know if you’re paying too much. The end result is a more profitable business for you.
The Restaurant Food Index is offered as a downloadable report and as an app.
The Orderly app gives you access to a searchable index of over 100 ingredients. These RFI ingredient prices are updated in real time in the app and RFI ingredients are mapped to specific purchases you make.
The Orderly app will show the ingredient price points you paid tracked against national and local pricing.
The report is a monthly downloadable PDF that contains a searchable index of over 100 ingredients, pricing charts and descriptions. The report will come with a national index and a local index.
You can download the Orderly app with RFI data on this page.
You can download the RFI report on this page.
Once you’ve downloaded the app, you’ll be able to see the most up-to-date RFI data in the app. You’ll also receive an email with instructions and a link to download the report.
The report is available immediately.
Please contact us with any questions about how this works.
All RFI data in the app and report comes with national price trends and local price trends. When you download the Orderly app, a local index will be assigned to you based on the zip code you register with.
The local index shows prices paid within your local market. In some areas, the local index will be a state and in other areas the local index will be a region.
As noted, the index is based off real restaurant supplier purchases. In order for an ingredient to qualify we must track 20 purchases from 20 suppliers and 20 restaurants over a two-week period.
This ensures there is data integrity and the price information is valuable to you.
The RFI can be purchased in two ways:
1) As the Restaurant Food Index Report, or
2) As the Orderly app (which includes the Restaurant Food Index data and provides access to the report).
The cost for an annual subscription to the report is $1,200. The report is produced monthly. It is distributed on the 10th of the month.
The cost for a monthly subscription to the Orderly app is $165 for the standard app or $275 for the premium app. The app is updated daily with price data. And price data is matched against your specific purchases.
You can find more information on the standard and premium services on the Orderly website.
Orderly is currently offering a free trial of the Orderly app. You can find more information on the Orderly website. See the pricing page for additional details.
If you are running a multi-unit group or franchise, we recommend you purchase an instance of the app for each location.
This will provide you with a local index for each location and a tool to track food spend and prices at your locations from one mobile app.
Contact us and we’ll show you how it works on a demo.
