RESTAU RA N T RE V E N U E
1
MANAG E ME N T
Online Certificate Program
OVERVIEW
Strategic restaurant revenue management is a critical ingredient in your recipe for
profitability. But using a proven system to manage key dining variables has impacts
beyond revenue—it has a ripple effect on customer service. Creating optimal dining
flows, table mixes, and pricing helps you meet customer needs better than ever before.
This certificate program consists of five two-week courses that cover the fundamentals
of successful revenue management, providing practical guidance for implementing
a restaurant revenue management strategy. Learn to optimize occupancy, table
mix, meal duration, and pricing. Then, bring it together with a proven process for
implementing a revenue management strategy that boosts profits. Finally, learn
additional tools for diagnosing and resolving operational problems and for improving
the customer service experience.
COURSES COURSE LENGTH FORMAT
5 2 weeks 100% online
COURSES
• Introduction to Restaurant Revenue Management
• Menu Design and Engineering
• Optimizing Restaurant Space and Pricing
• Managing Meal Duration and Reservations
• Building Demand During Slow Periods
Visit ecornell.cornell.edu
7 COURSES
2 INSIDE the PROGRAM
100% ONLINE
KEY TAKEAWAYS
• Create an income statement that records help you improve occupancy rates and
the information that is critical to your control meal duration
specific type of restaurant • Develop the skills you’ll need to
• Interpret your data, identify trends, and determine each stage of the customer’s
catch issues that can have a positive or dining experience
negative impact on your operation • Apply strategies to accommodate arrival
• Analyze your financial and performance patterns and manage occupancy and
information to identify, implement, and meal duration
evaluate improvement solutions • Provide guidance on how to implement
• React to the advantages and strategies that will be most profitable
disadvantages of a restaurant • Use variable-pricing approaches
reservation system to develop recommendations for
• Analyze and identify the factors that will improving revenue
WHO SHOULD ENROLL
• Restaurant owners, managers, and performance
operators • Hospitality professionals
• Foodservice professionals responsible • Executive chefs
for their organization’s financial
WHAT YOU’LL EARN
• Restaurant Revenue Management Certificate from
Cornell Peter and Stephanie Nolan School of Hotel
Administration
• 50 Professional Development Hours (5 CEUs)
Visit ecornell.cornell.edu
7 COURSES
3
COURSE
DESCRIPTIONS
100% ONLINE
INTRODUCTION TO RESTAURANT REVENUE MANAGEMENT
Owning or managing a restaurant is a challenging prospect in today’s competitive food
service environment. To increase your chances of success, you need a proven system
of data-driven tools focused on profits, not just costs.
In this course Professor Kimes will guide you through the restaurant revenue
management process, providing real-world examples, strategies, and techniques
that will help you apply these tools to your own restaurant. You will explore the key
inputs of space, time, and price to determine how you make appropriate trade-offs
to maximize restaurant revenue. Using spreadsheet tools, you will calculate critical
metrics and establish baseline performance levels. Based on these levels, you will
identify the most significant challenges and determine which strategies will be most
effective in overcoming these issues and optimizing your restaurant’s revenue and
overall performance.
MENU DESIGN AND ENGINEERING
According to recent research, customers spend only one or two minutes reviewing
a restaurant’s menu. This provides you with just a small window of opportunity to
capture your customers’ attention and help them find just what they are looking
for. In this course, Professor Sheryl Kimes will present you with proven strategies
and techniques that can help you optimize your menu and increase the revenue it
generates for your restaurant.
Through the process of menu engineering, you will explore a unique approach
to categorizing menu items based on profitability and sales volume. Using this
categorization, you can implement a variety of strategies to increase the overall
profitability of your menu. You will also explore several effective menu design
techniques that will help you improve how you name and describe menu items and
organize and highlight them to showcase your most profitable, best-selling dishes.
Critical to your restaurant revenue management program is your approach to pricing,
and you will determine the strategies that make the most sense for your restaurant.
Visit ecornell.cornell.edu
7 COURSES
4
COURSE
DESCRIPTIONS
100% ONLINE
You will walk away from this course with a set of practical tools you can use right now
to maximize your revenue, whether your restaurant is slow, busy, or somewhere in-
between.
OPTIMIZING RESTAURANT SPACE AND PRICING
When your restaurant is busy, you might think that you can’t possibly generate any
additional revenue. However, in this course Professor Sheryl Kimes will provide you
will a set of tools you can use to optimize your table mix so it better reflects the mix
of parties you have coming in through the door. You will also learn how to select and
place tables, assign guests to tables, and set the ambiance of your restaurant to grow
your revenue. Finally, you will devise pricing strategies that are most effective when
your restaurant is busy.
MANAGING MEAL DURATION AND RESERVATIONS
When your restaurant is busy, every minute can count towards increasing your
revenue. Professor Kimes explores how reducing meal duration, even by a single
minute, can increase revenue potential. You need to consider the style of your
restaurant and your customers when thinking about what an appropriate meal
duration is. Then you can analyze the six stages of meal duration to determine
where you can reduce time while maintaining a pleasant dining experience for your
customers.
Additionally, the way you manage reservations is crucial, especially during busy
periods. There are several things you need to decide when it comes to how you
are going to take reservations in your restaurant. You will examine the different
approaches to taking and managing reservations, whether by phone, online, or mobile.
You can use a dedicated website for the restaurant, a third party website, or a third
party app.
Visit ecornell.cornell.edu
7 COURSES
5
COURSE
DESCRIPTIONS
100% ONLINE
Professor Kimes will give you practical strategies to determine how you can improve
your meal duration and your reservation systems, which are critically important to
increasing revenue when your restaurant is at capacity.
BUILDING DEMAND DURING SLOW PERIODS
How can you increase your revenue when your restaurant is slow and not performing
to capacity? In this course, Professor Kimes will discuss several revenue management
tools and techniques you can use to improve your restaurant’s performance when it is
slow.
First you will consider how to maximize your distribution channels and consider the
costs of online reservations and ordering systems and how to balance the costs with
the benefits. How can you make it easy for customers to come to your restaurant?
Another important tool you can use is promotions. You will explore different strategies
such as happy hours, special events, and other options that can entice customers
to come to your restaurant. Finally, you will consider pricing and determine what
approaches are most effective when your restaurant is slow.
Visit ecornell.cornell.edu
