Your back office should support your back of house, not take it over

We help restaurant owners remove administrative burdens on their time, bring transparency to their business, and scale profitability.

Fountain Creek is the back office partner that will set your restaurant up for success

Transparency

We focus on the financials that matter - we help you understand your ACTUAL cash and profit week to week which means taking into account your point of sale, your bills outstanding, your debts, your savings and your credit card balances so you never have to wonder again how much capital you have available.

Growth

Our goal is to give you information to grow your bottom line - full stop. We will help you look at every aspect of your business, from pricing, to customer analytics, to supplier costs (and hidden costs), to expense reviews - all to find ways to improve your margin and estimate future performance.

Quality

We take care of the headache stuff - with best practices - getting bills paid, filing 1099s, tracking sales tax, identifying credit notes (and making sure they get applied!), issuing invoices, helping get on terms with suppliers, and keeping you aware of compliance risks so you can focus on your quality of service.

Complex software, illegible reports,

an actual expert partner

Your dedicated Fountain Creek team will always prioritize communication - we prepare weekly and monthly video summaries of your financial results, are always available for discussions via our virtual office hours, and establish a schedule for monthly meetings that we can do in-person and on-site. Day 1 we start managing your financial software tools and providing all reporting, bookkeeping, and planning in your mobile accessible portal.

Book an appointment.

We are available to connect, whether you are still considering opening or have multiple sites under management. Book a time with a team leader and tell us about your business. We love meeting restaurant owners - whether we are a fit for you or not - and if you are based in Western Connecticut you might even see us as a customer!

Pick the level of back office support that’s right for your restaurant.

Fountain Creek will work directly with you to customize a Finance Department that scales with your business. You will have a clear point of contact for everything from financial strategy, advice, and analysis all the way to processing, payments, and bookkeeping. Your dedicated Finance Department will include a full technology stack of software solutions (included in your subscription) and well documented best practices that are easily handed off if you ever outgrow us. You and your team will have a back office partner at your fingertips with Fountain Creek.

Support

$120 per week

Best practice bookkeeping, accounting, and reporting with weekly financial snapshots and detailed monthly packets that will give you a complete and clear picture of where you are making and losing money in your business.

  • We oversee the financial integration between your POS and the accounting system and track sales per day along with transaction fees, tips, and other non-sales charges.

  • We take all bills and upload them into your accounting portal (using our preferred accounting solution Xero), review all vendor transactions, and reconcile those bills - noting any issues and discrepancies. We will flag unusual transactions and give you a clear picture of cash after anticipated payments outstanding.

  • We will oversee the integration of your Payroll solution with the accounting software (for supported solutions that include Justworks, Gusto, or Square Payroll), and assign department level tracking for each employee and categorize all expenses by type so you know who is getting paid what.

  • We will work with you in our first month of service to identify key suppliers to identify major input/inventory costs and track these by supplier and by purpose.

  • We understand that large recurring orders from local businesses can be a huge advantage but requires significant administrative follow up. We will track your invoices and their payment status alongside helping you set up templates for follow up and collection.

  • Keeping up with federal, state, and local requirements and best practices can be overwhelming, so we help you stay in compliance with best practice checklists on things like cash tips, reporting requirements, sales tax, and CPA coordination for year end taxes.

  • Basic cash accounting with monthly closes by the 15th of the following month.

  • Our monthly reporting, even at the ‘Transparency’ package, includes labor, input, cash, and revenue summaries. The monthly reports will include additional insights and analysis we are highlighting.

  • Budgeting, even at a basic level, is critical for the success of your business - to know if/how/why you are on or off plan will allow you to be nimble and adjust strategy throughout the year - so we offer an entry level annual 90 minute Strategic Review where we walk you through the basics of budgeting and help you establish some best practices for the upcoming year.

  • It’s critical to have regular visibility into the financial operations of the business, so in addition to the weekly snapshots and the monthly financial summary we offer 45 minute quarterly Financial Discussions and a 90 minute annual Strategic Review.

  • We pay for and manage a Xero Accounting Software subscription that is our primary place for documenting and reporting your financials - this account is easily handed off to your in-house control when you have outgrown Fountain Creek.

  • During onboarding we will set up an accounting email address at your domain that will forward to us.

Service

$300 per week

Support + a more hands on support for your restaurant that takes on all the administrative burden that holds you back from the more important management, training, and menu tasks that can grow your business.

  • We generate invoices for every unit sold in your restaurant - this means we have item level details and can group your sales reports by type of expense and align that with the labor and input costs that apply to that specific category of revenue. We also separate these invoices by cash vs card so we can audit your cash balances being deposited each week.

  • At the Support level we take on ownership of the bill payment process - we customize your approval rules to ensure you have maximum control with minimal effort as we run all bills through draft, review, approve, and pay processing. We also begin recording all your bills to the line item level and tracking all items purchased from all vendors/suppliers (particularly as it relates to inventory).

  • We help employees get onboarded to the payroll system, coordinate with the manager on hours approvals, ensure tips are reported and paid out accurately and process timely and transparent payments. We work as the back office support system for the manager as they oversee the team on site.

  • We collect any receipts and bills related to inventory purchases and record those at the individual unit count level and ensure those bills get paid accurately and on time. We will communicate with any suppliers that have discrepancies and ensure payments are secure and avoid unnecessary processing fees.

  • We customize your approval rules to ensure you have maximum control with minimal effort as we coordinate with your order taking POS, your manager, and the customer to draft, review, approve, and collect on invoices.

  • In addition to best practice support that includes tracking and documenting all accounts and transactions, we will oversee and pay sales tax and any 1099 requirements.

  • Our accounting at the support level goes to individual units costs (items purchases, hours worked, equipment purchased) and tracks accounts payable and receivable alongside other near term cash expenses to give you a detailed analysis of cash estimates, gross profit, labor allocation and more.

  • From our onboarding we will will establish a “Week-end Close” day that suits your business - within a week of that day your prior weeks accounting will be complete so that you and your team can sit down with fresh information every week. This detailed weekly report will have full margin analysis, and we also include detailed labor, inventory, cash, and customer analysis in your monthly reports.

  • In addition to an annual 90 minute budget review, we allocate an extra hour each quarter to discuss financial strategy and budget tracking with you. We update our budget assumptions monthly to show updated full year estimates throughout the year.

  • Monthly 45 minute Financial Discussions and quarterly 90 minute Strategic Reviews are included in the Support tier. We are also willing to scope custom projects with Support tier clients that involve deeper analysis and consultation.

  • We pay for and manage a bill.com and other invoicing and bill pay software including providing a custom portal that summarizes and includes all of your Finance Department systems, data, and analysis. We also pay for software that is used in our collection and processing of inventory receipt capture.

  • We manage and maintain a zero in-box policy for anything received to your accounting@ inbox. We will establish rules for escalation with you so nothing gets missed, but you can rest easy knowing someone is watching the financial communications.

Concierge

$660 per week

Service + a full back office solution that is one message away support for your manager in order fulfillment, menu changes, and all online supplier, employee, and customer communications.

  • Tracked menu items sold are recorded daily which allows us to produce near real-time margin analysis and sales reports. We also work to establish connections and manage menu changes with all 3rd party sales apps - working closely with your manager to ensure they can focus on their on-premise responsibilities.

  • We work directly with the manager to resolve any service payment (plumbing, electric, IT, etc.) so they can move on to more important things when the problem is solved. We also run regular audits of all expenses to ensure market rates and no unnecessary subscriptions or vendors.

  • We work with the manager to handle hours review and employee communications - even scheduling issues and other staff considerations.

  • We maintain regular dialog and price sheets with all major suppliers to ensure you are getting the best ingredients and the right prices. The Manager will have a custom FCS Order Guide that will show PAR levels, typical pricing, and order history that gives them one click order requests that the Fountain Creek team will fulfill with a set of directions specific to your business and your supplier relationships.

  • Catering and pre-order taking and customer communications via 3rd party communication (email, Square POS forms, messaging, etc.)

  • We will regularly undertake compliance reviews and help coordinate, store, and update permits and other local requirements.

  • We will keep best practice accrual accounting, detailed inventory levels and cost assignments to items sold, and consolidated reporting for multiple sites.

  • Performance tracking and real-time estimates and scenario analysis all available anytime via your custom FCS Portal.

  • Scenario analysis, new investment and site opening planning, multi-site consolidated estimates are part of a multi-stage Budgeting process that is designed for board level approval as well as manager and site target setting.

  • Includes an annual 180 minute Working Session to review scenarios, estimates and budget approval as well as unlimited 20 minute Quick Check-ins for any and all urgent financial questions.

  • In addition to management and payment of all Finance Department software, we oversee and manage other key software updates and integrations including point of sale customer interactions and menu updates.

  • We serve the first line of defense for all internal and outbound communications with strict rules established with you to ensure everything is resolved or escalated in ways that give the manager the best mix of control, flexibility, and freedom.

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