How to make money with the fast food restaurants?

[darkbetter]

I took out loans to accomplish tutorial objectives, mainly headquarters and warehouse setup. Expensive gifts I was selling in the gift shop was my main source of income whereas I was barely turning a profit with the fast food shop. So I gambled, took out the last 10k loan I could and bought a pizza oven as well as some pizzas from the wholesaler and... it didn't work. Nothing I was selling even came close to the profit margins I got from expensive gifts.

Btw got barely 1k and no more loans available so I think this is the end for this save.

[David Estes Creations]

Originally posted by Sarsgamer:

Yep! I reported this issue awhile back, but it's pretty minor. It's not very often you're in the store watching, especially in later game.

You're right that later game it doesn't matter much, but to all the people that are struggling with this store right now, it's definitely a problem that needs to be addressed!!

[Le'Stranger Wuv'Bottom]

After a few attempts at the tutorial, I found starting a donut/coffee business as the second business and fast food 3rd has worked better than what the tutorial has you do.

[gnrnr]

The fast food shop was a very difficult enterprise. At the time the game wanted me to get into Burgers, Doughnuts were a better option as there were no competitors and similar demand levels. Took me ages to get the fast food place to make $150 average. At the same time my small gift shop was doing over $2k per day. Now that i have my HQ setup and importing the items directly it is slightly better, but the demand for burgers fell to 50% from 100% so it has slowed right up again, just as I got it above break even. That shop still only does about $100 per day.

[Polydeuces]

I think there are a lot of factors that go into how well the business will do. Making sure all your scores are high, and your employees are trained up is a good place to start. Location I think is extremely important as well as your businesses hours. I noticed in particular that my gift shop shouldn't bother opening at all before noon. Marketing will help if you have the money for it. By my burger joints third day we're at -27$. 2 grills, 2 vending machines, 2 registers, 2 places to sit so far, a trash can and a cleaning station. Once I get my scores up I imagine the profit will sky rocket as I'm selling already nearly 300 burgers a day in just 8 hour days.. Also pay attention to wages. You can also mitigate some of the loss by working yourself.

[Lv1 Magikarp]

I have my hours like a typical takeaway catering to the drinkers, open late / close early hours, anyone know if this is a factor at all with fast food? Or shall I just change to "normal" hours?

[Rhia]

I closed mine as soon as it started losing money, you dont have to keep it open once the objective is complete, also key is location and traffic. I moved my gift shop out of a 20 traffic starting shop into a 50 traffic on one of the main roads and the thing makes 11k a day, its basically funded my early game expansion to 4 businesses

[lusterredux]

The first save I had, fast food would lose money no matter what I did. That location was in a low traffic, smaller plot (the 800ish ones). I tried again on a later save, in a 50 traffic/30 capacity/2,400 size plot. That one makes 2-3x what my initial gift shop does. Seems like the traffic metric really matters for fast food.

You have to place your gift shop in the Garment District for the tutorial, and also adhere to the size restrictions, but you can put your fast food restaurant in Hell's Kitchen and buy a big plot (which you should anyway so you can expand offerings later).

[Swisspike]

Here's the list of stuff I will have, BEFORE I start the restaurant:

Cash registers, x2
Cabinets, x2
Paper bags, 1000 each x2
Industrial Grill
Soda Fridge
Storage units, x4
Industrial fryer x2
Salad bar
Restaurant booth, x4
Pizza oven
Cleaning supplies
225 m2 restaurant

Initial capital outlays? About 35 thousand dollars. This doesn't include labor, or ingredients, which will be at least another 5 thousand.

This will enable me to have 30 customers per hour, running on two cash registers. I am not done researching, and I MAY need a second grill, oven, and salad bar. Not sure yet. I will be selling:

Hot dogs, burgers, fries, soda, pizza, donuts, cupcakes, and salad.

if you start a restaurant with just one item, you will fail. For sure.

[lusterredux]

Originally posted by Swisspike:

if you start a restaurant with just one item, you will fail. For sure.

I mean, mine was profitable with 1 grill, 1 drink fridge, 1 register, a table with six chairs, and a 32 skill level cashier. It became more profitable when I added a second of each (to hit the 30 cap). I really think people are just placing their businesses in low traffic areas.

[Lv1 Magikarp]

Like everyone else said you just need to sell multiple things, honestly feel that shouldn't have to be the answer though but hey ho.

I think really the tutorial for setting up your warehouse / delivery system should be for the fast food restaurant not the gift shop, you could include a quick pointer that the fast food restaurant will need extra food for sale etc. and to deal with the extra load of stock you need...boom...your new warehouse that you just completed.

It did however teach me to really check how my businesses are doing and figure out why they weren't making as much as expected which helped a lot with my law office and jewellery store.

I'm so addicted send help

[Pr1m3]

I'm assuming the balance gets thrown off by the different difficulty levels? I'm on my first run so I chose Easy, to get the fundamentals down. The first tutorial gift shop business is netting $2k/day with cheap and expensive gifts (and soda I guess). For the second tutorial business I put my fast food shop in a 30ish traffic zone, and I'm selling hot dogs burger and soda, netting about $800/day. So weak in comparison but I'm making okay money. Like I said this is on easy, so are the people operating at a loss on a harder difficulty?

[Swisspike]

Originally posted by lusterredux:

Originally posted by Swisspike:

if you start a restaurant with just one item, you will fail. For sure.

I mean, mine was profitable with 1 grill, 1 drink fridge, 1 register, a table with six chairs, and a 32 skill level cashier. It became more profitable when I added a second of each (to hit the 30 cap). I really think people are just placing their businesses in low traffic areas.

What do you recommend for minimum size, and traffic? This is where I am at, next, is to rent a space for my restaurant.

[Swisspike]

Originally posted by Pr1m3:

I'm assuming the balance gets thrown off by the different difficulty levels? I'm on my first run so I chose Easy, to get the fundamentals down. The first tutorial gift shop business is netting $2k/day with cheap and expensive gifts (and soda I guess). For the second tutorial business I put my fast food shop in a 30ish traffic zone, and I'm selling hot dogs burger and soda, netting about $800/day. So weak in comparison but I'm making okay money. Like I said this is on easy, so are the people operating at a loss on a harder difficulty?

You can sell any product in any area. I would suggest adding in donut, and cupcakes. Easy money, without much additional effort.

[Nique84]

The reason why your fastfood restaurant isn't bringing in profits (or any store later in game) is that you are probably playing a pirated version of the game ;).

[Marcondy]

For the fast food objective, I really took my time and hired the staff and trained them every single day up to 100%. Every day I used the profits of the gift shop to buy more items for the restaurant - It took roughly 30 in game days to build it up before I finally opened it up. BUT, the patience was worth it as now have 4 cashiers full time (and 4 part time for the weekends) all at 100% Customer Service, plus 2 of everything (grill, hotdogs, fryers, salad bars, soda machines). 6 Diner Booths and also 2 tables with 6 chairs on each. It makes roughly $5k per day in a good traffic area (40) (versus £1k per day if I stand in there and watch, mainly due to the bug stated previously on this thread).

Before moving on with the tutorial objectives, also decided to start up another gift shop but in a very high traffic area (50) - That now makes me $20k per day :)