GP calculator
Gross profit in both directions. What your current price actually delivers, and what price your target margin actually requires, with VAT stripped out properly rather than quietly inflating the answer.
GP calculator
Headroom
Enter a cost, a price and a target to see how much movement this dish has.
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A good GP percentage on a cheap dish is not a good result.
Gross profit percentage measures efficiency. It does not measure money. A £7 starter at 78 percent GP returns £4.55. A £32 main at 62 percent returns £16.53. If you manage the menu on percentage alone, you will systematically favour the first and squeeze the second, and your weighted GP will look healthy while your cash position does not.
The number to watch alongside percentage is the cash margin, which is why it sits next to it above. And the number that decides your accounts is neither of them individually, it is your weighted gross profit: total cash GP over total net sales, driven by what people actually order rather than by what is theoretically available to order.
That is the whole reason menu engineering scores dishes on cash margin and sales mix rather than on percentage.
See all the formulas
How to calculate food cost, with the VAT step
Gross profit behaves differently in each part of the menu. See lunch menu profitability for the lunch price effect and dessert menu profitability for batch made puddings.
GP calculator FAQs
Is GP worked out before or after VAT?
After. Gross profit is calculated on net sales, so the VAT has to come off the menu price before you divide anything. A dish at £19.00 on the menu is £15.83 of net sales once 20 percent VAT is stripped, and running the sum on £19.00 instead will flatter your GP by several points. That is the single most common arithmetic error in UK kitchens, and it is why the toggle above exists. Most US costing tools have no concept of it at all. The menu pricing guide works through what that error costs across a whole menu.
What is a good GP percentage for food?
Most UK restaurants and gastropubs work to between 68 and 72 percent on food, and wet led sites often run higher on drink and lower on food deliberately. Treat those as orientation rather than a target: the right number depends on your rent, your labour and what your room will pay. A site at 65 percent with high volume and tight labour can be considerably healthier than one at 74 percent that nobody visits.
What is the difference between GP and food cost percentage?
They are the same measurement from opposite ends, and they add up to 100. A dish at 70 percent GP runs a 30 percent food cost. UK kitchens almost always talk in GP, American costing software and most online calculators talk in food cost percentage, which is why the two sets of advice can look contradictory when they are saying exactly the same thing.
How do I work backwards from a target GP to a menu price?
Divide the plate cost by one minus the target as a decimal, then add VAT back on. A £5.70 plate cost at a 70 percent target gives £5.70 divided by 0.30, which is £19.00 net, or £22.80 on the menu with VAT. The calculator above does this in the Price needed to hit target readout, so you can see immediately whether the number it wants is a price your room would actually pay.
Why does my actual GP not match what this calculates?
Because this gives you theoretical GP, which is what the dish would return if every plate left the pass exactly to specification. Actual GP comes from your stock take, and the gap between the two is waste, over portioning, trim, staff food, comps and theft. Two to three points of difference is normal. Four or more and something structural is going on, which is what the eleven leaks guide works through.
Should I price every dish to the same GP?
No, and doing so is one of the more expensive habits in menu pricing. Percentage is a ratio, and your bank account takes pounds. Holding every line to 70 percent pushes you towards cheap, high percentage dishes and penalises the expensive ones that actually carry the night. Price to a cash margin your room will bear, then watch the weighted GP across what people genuinely order. That is what a menu audit measures.
Does this work for drinks as well as food?
Yes, the arithmetic is identical. Enter the cost of the serve rather than the plate cost. Expect different targets: draught and wine typically run a lower GP percentage than spirits, and the mix across them matters more than any single line.