What is the COGS dashboard?
COGS (Cost of Goods Sold) shows you how much of every baht in revenue goes to the ingredients on the plate. It compares what your recipes say should be spent (theoretical) against what you actually spent on deliveries (actual), breaks the cost down by category, product, and supplier, and tracks price changes over time.
Why is it important?
Food cost is the single biggest expense in most F&B operations. A 1-point change in Food Cost % against ฿1,000,000 of monthly revenue is ฿10,000 in either direction. Watching this number without context is blind; COGS gives you the context to know whether a rise is from supplier price hikes, recipe drift, portioning, waste, or menu mix.
Tab 1: COGS
The core view. Answers "how much are ingredients costing us, and where is the money going?"
The two headline numbers
Stat | What it means |
Theoretical Food Cost % | What your recipes say you should have spent on ingredients, as a percentage of revenue. Calculated from recipe ingredient cost × units sold ÷ revenue. |
Actual Food Cost % | What you actually spent on ingredients, from goods receipts ÷ revenue. Includes everything purchased — even what hasn't been used yet. |
💡 The gap between Theoretical and Actual is unaccounted loss — waste, over-portioning, shrinkage, or recipe inaccuracy. A small gap (under 2 points) is healthy; above 5 points signals a real control problem.
Food Cost % Over Time
Both lines on the same chart, plotted weekly:
Blue line — Actual Food Cost % (from goods received)
Orange line — Theoretical Food Cost % (from recipes)
Watch the gap between them. Parallel lines mean your recipe costs are stable; a widening gap means loss is growing. A sudden jump in Actual above Theoretical often means a big delivery landed without matching sales yet (timing) — wait a week and see if it normalises.
COGS by Category
Categories ranked by theoretical COGS with a cumulative % line (the combo chart), plus a table version showing Food Cost % and Gross Margin % per category.
The bar+line chart reveals concentration — if the cumulative line hits 80% after just 2–3 categories, your cost base is concentrated (and those categories deserve the most attention). The table shows which categories have the worst percentage food cost — often different from the ones with the highest absolute COGS.
Product Cost Drivers
Top 30 raw products ranked by total COGS consumed. The bar+line combo chart shows concentration; the table version adds "% of Total COGS" per product. Focus cost-reduction effort on the top 10 — a 5% price reduction or portion reduction on a product that's 15% of your COGS is 0.75% off your total food cost.
Spend by Supplier
Suppliers ranked by actual goods received spend, with a cumulative % line. Tells you how dependent you are on each supplier and where to focus renegotiation. If one supplier is above 40% of spend, you have both leverage (volume) and risk (concentration).
Tab 2: Price Tracking
Answers "which suppliers are quietly raising prices, and on which products?" Silent price creep is one of the hardest margin leaks to catch — a 5% raise on a high-volume ingredient compounds over months before anyone notices.
Product Price Changes
Table of every product where the latest goods receipt price differs from the previous one. Sorted by largest percentage change first. Each row shows:
Product name
Previous price
Latest price
% change
Supplier
Date of change
Cross-reference with Product Cost Drivers on the COGS tab. A 10% price increase on your #2 cost driver is far more urgent than a 30% increase on a garnish you rarely buy.
Current Selection
Shows which product is currently filtered for the chart below. Click a product row in the Product Price Changes table to change the filter.
Price History by Supplier
For the selected product, price per unit plotted over time — one line per supplier. Every goods receipt shows as a point. Use this to:
Spot upward drift from a supplier (gradual increase = margin erosion)
Compare pricing between suppliers you use for the same product
Catch sudden jumps that need questioning before the next delivery
How it's calculated
💡 Theoretical COGS = Σ (recipe ingredient quantity × unit price × units sold)
💡 Actual COGS = Σ (goods received in period × invoiced price)
💡 Theoretical Food Cost % = Theoretical COGS ÷ Revenue
💡 Actual Food Cost % = Actual COGS ÷ Revenue
Unit prices use the most recent invoiced price per product. Theoretical numbers only include items with complete recipes — Recipe Coverage on the Profitability and Menu Engineering dashboards tells you how much of your menu is covered.
Worked example
In a week where revenue was ฿200,000:
Recipe ingredient usage totalled ฿55,000 (Theoretical COGS)
Goods received totalled ฿62,000 (Actual COGS)
Results:
Theoretical Food Cost % = 55,000 ÷ 200,000 = 27.5%
Actual Food Cost % = 62,000 ÷ 200,000 = 31.0%
Gap: 3.5 percentage points — worth investigating
That 3.5-point gap on ฿200,000 of revenue is ฿7,000 of ingredients unaccounted for in one week. Over a year, that's ~฿364,000.
Action Steps
Watch the gap first, not the absolute level. A Theoretical of 32% and Actual of 34% is a well-controlled kitchen. A Theoretical of 28% and Actual of 36% is a leaky one.
If the gap is wide: check the Waste dashboard (are you logging waste?), then Yield Performance (is stock being counted?), then recipe accuracy (are portions drifting?).
If Actual Food Cost % is climbing but Theoretical is flat: supplier prices are rising or you're over-receiving. Go to Price Tracking and look at your top cost drivers.
If both are climbing in parallel: menu mix is shifting toward high-cost items. Cross-check with Menu Engineering — is a Star becoming more popular? Has a Workhorse taken over?
Review Product Cost Drivers monthly. Pick the top 5 and ask: can we renegotiate, substitute, or reduce portion on any?
Check Price Tracking weekly if possible. The earlier you catch a 5% supplier hike on a top-3 product, the sooner you can push back or switch.
If one supplier dominates Spend by Supplier: use that leverage — volume discounts, payment term improvements, or price locks for core items.
Frequently asked questions
Why is my Actual Food Cost % higher than Theoretical?
Three usual causes: (1) unlogged waste, (2) over-portioning, or (3) a big delivery that landed this period but will be used over the next. For (3), wait a cycle before judging. For (1) and (2), check the Waste and Yield Performance dashboards.
Why is my Theoretical Food Cost % sometimes higher than Actual?
Usually a timing issue — you used stock this period from deliveries received in the previous period. Over a 60–90 day window, the two should roughly converge. If Theoretical is consistently higher, your recipes might be overstating quantities.
What's a good Food Cost % target?
Full-service restaurants: 28–35%. QSR: 30–35%. Bars: 18–25%. High-end/steakhouse: 35–42%. Numbers vary by cuisine — compare against your own trend rather than a fixed benchmark.
Why are some products missing from Product Cost Drivers?
Only products tied to menu items through recipes are counted — the table shows products consumed by sales, not everything in inventory. Products without recipes appear in the Ordering and Waste dashboards but not here.
How far back does Price History go?
As far back as goods receipts exist in the system for that outlet. If you just started using Papaya Inventory, the chart will fill in over time as more receipts are logged.
A supplier's price went up but it's not showing in Price Changes. Why?
The table compares the latest receipt price against the previous one. If you haven't received from that supplier since the price change, it won't appear until the next delivery. Check Price History by Supplier for the full timeline.