Wholesale supplier for our main ingredients sent an email announcing an 18% increase effective in two weeks, citing costs. Our agreement runs to March. I have 400 printed menus and boards priced for the old cost. Reprinting is about 300 and takes a week. Margin on the affected dishes was already thin. Do I eat it until March, reprint, or try to push back, and does pushing back ever actually work?
Do not reprint 400 menus for this. A small printed insert or a discreet sticker over the two or three affected prices costs about 20 and buys you until March, at which point you reprice everything properly in one go. Customers notice a reprinted menu with everything up far more than they notice two items moving by 60p.
This is the practical answer I was missing. I had framed it as reprint or absorb and there is obviously a middle.
Work out the actual pound impact before deciding how much energy this deserves. Take the affected items, multiply by last month's real sales counts, and see what 18% costs you per week. I have twice discovered that a scary sounding increase was 40 a week, and once discovered a boring one was 300.
Also use this as the prompt to get a second supplier quoted, even if you do not switch. Having a live alternative changes how the next conversation goes, and single-sourcing your main ingredients is its own risk regardless of price.
Agreed. I split my main lines across two suppliers at roughly 70/30 purely so the 30 exists when I need it.
@lowell_frame · 9mo ago · 3 replies
Read the agreement before you do anything else, specifically for a price variation clause. Plenty of wholesale agreements let them adjust with notice, in which case the term you thought you had is a delivery commitment rather than a price lock. If there is no such clause, an 18% jump mid-term is something you can push back on, and pushing back does work more often than people expect — usually not to zero, but to a smaller increase, a phased one, or the old price honoured on your top two lines.
When I have done this the thing that worked was being specific: your volume, how long you have bought from them, and a number you can live with. "This is difficult for us" gets nothing. "We buy 340 units a month, we have been with you four years, we can absorb 8% now and the rest in March" gets a phone call.
Reply
Report
@chainline_chris · 9mo ago
There is a variation clause with 14 days notice, which they have technically met. Going in with the phased ask instead.
Reply
Report
@resole_ruth · 9mo ago
Even where they are within their rights, a phased increase costs them nothing and keeps a four year customer. Worth asking every time.
Reply
Report