Case Study: Millsy’s Café Bar
The challenge of rising costs
Millsy’s Café Bar in Earlsdon is a fabulous all-purpose community venue open for breakfast, lunch and dinner and is one of Coventry’s most popular venues for evening drinks and private parties.
STREET is the sister venue just a few doors away and offers an incredibly authentic smoke house
experience including 14-hour applewood smoked beef briskets, 8-hour BBQ smoked Boston butt
pork shoulder plus amazing, smashed burgers and all the lovely sides and desserts you would expect.
Millsy’s started trading in 2000 and STREET opened its doors in 2015, both businesses are well
established and loved community venues with a great long established leadership team but like
most businesses running through and post pandemic Millsy’s and STREET have faced significant
challenges including junior staff recruitment and rising costs in almost every part of the business.
Ben had worked with Simon when he was account director for Millsy’s in a previous role, so Ben
knew it wasn’t a complete leap of faith and was intrigued to find out more about how Profit Hound
might support the business objectives and challenges.
"“We are a very progressive business, working hard on our marketing and targeted sales
promotions to drive revenue and had turned every stone to find cost savings within our business and despite working with a long establish procurement business we struggled to find new savings, something needed to change…………” - Ben Colvin, Group General Manager
So what happened next?
Price Matching
A line-by-line price matching was completed which showed material like for like saving and
along with the promise of improved chef support.
Ordering
A bespoke, user-friendly order sheet was developed with the chefs to guide them to the best
price and agreed product specs. This live document is updated and shared each month.
Monthly Purchasing Review
Electronic spend data is collected by Profit Hound from all suppliers and validated against
agreed pricing. Credits are returned to Millsy’s for any overcharges.
Menu Development
Simon’s expertise extends far beyond purchasing and the team called on that knowledge to
challenge and support with effective product and menu engineering to enhance profitability.
Additional Support from Profit Hound
Simon’s contacts have helped us identify the potential for overseas recruitment.
When discussing breakfast production technique and potential wastage Simon offered up a great regeneration oven solution and even arranged a site demo!
100% Flexible
Profit Hound take Zero Supplier Payments and No Nominated Suppliers which has given
ultimate flexibility, this approach has proved invaluable when Millsy’s and Street were
approached by new suppliers and one that offered free chips!
Which meant completely independent analysis was possible to support the best option for Millsy’s.
The Results
"“We have been working with Simon and Profit Hound for over a year now and delighted with the
results, we were struggling to achieve a 65% food margin but for the first full year of trading together
we achieved closer 69% margin despite a hugely turbulent time for hospitality with food inflation
coming at us from all directions”.
“I would have no hesitation in recommending Profit Hound to any business that is actively seeking to
improve their food profitability, the Profit Hound solution is much more than just procurement and
along with Simon’s knowledge, experience and people skills means the benefit really sticks”.
- Ben Colvin, Group General Manager