A 60% Fish Price Rise on a Fixed-Price Omakase
A 20-seat kaiseki restaurant serves one omakase menu at ¥12,000, tax and service excluded, and runs 480 covers a month. The food cost target is 32%; the current plate cost is ¥3,700, or 30.8%. The tai course uses a 160 g fillet of madai bought at ¥3,000/kg, i.e. ¥480. On Monday the supplier quotes ¥4,800/kg for the rest of the month because of poor landings and weather, with no cheaper grade available. The chef does not want to remove the tai course - it is the visual centrepiece of the menu. Labour is three full-time cooks plus one part-timer at about ¥1.8 million a month, and waste is estimated at 10% of purchased food. The owner wants options before changing the menu price, because regulars book months ahead.
1. Calculate the new plate cost and food cost percentage if nothing changes, and the price needed to restore 32%. Show each step.
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Step 1 - old tai cost. 160 g at ¥3,000/kg = 0.160 × 3,000 = ¥480.
Step 2 - new tai cost. 160 g at ¥4,800/kg = 0.160 × 4,800 = ¥768.
Step 3 - increase. 768 − 480 = ¥288 per cover.
Step 4 - new plate cost. 3,700 + 288 = ¥3,988.
Step 5 - new food cost percentage. 3,988 ÷ 12,000 = 33.2%, against a 32% target.
Step 6 - price to restore 32%. 3,988 ÷ 0.32 = ¥12,462.50, so ¥12,500 in practice. At ¥12,500 the ratio is 3,988 ÷ 12,500 = 31.9%.
Step 7 - monthly impact. 480 covers × ¥288 = ¥138,240 of extra ingredient spend a month, against monthly revenue of 480 × ¥12,000 = ¥5.76 million. That is about 2.4 percentage points of revenue if the price is not touched.
The gap is real but not a crisis - which is exactly why it should be handled deliberately rather than by quietly shrinking the slice.
2. Propose and evaluate at least three options, with numbers, and give your recommendation.
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- A. Price to ¥12,500, keep 160 g. Plate cost ¥3,988; ratio 31.9%. Revenue rises ¥500 × 480 = ¥240,000/month, which more than covers the ¥138,240 ingredient increase. Risk: regulars have booked at the old price and need notice.
- B. Cut to 130 g, hold ¥12,000. Tai 0.130 × 4,800 = ¥624; plate cost 3,700 − 480 + 624 = ¥3,844; ratio exactly 32.0%. It solves the arithmetic but removes 19% of the portion from the signature dish, which is visible on a kaiseki plate and reads as a hidden price rise.
- C. Change the fish. Kurodai or suzuki at about ¥3,200/kg: 0.160 × 3,200 = ¥512; plate cost ¥3,732; ratio 31.1%. Financially clean, but it changes the menu identity and needs the chef's agreement and a menu reprint.
- D. Cut waste from 10% to 7%. Saves about 3% of ¥3,700 = ¥111 per cover - helpful, but it does not close a ¥288 gap on its own.
Recommendation: combine A with D. Keep the 160 g tai, move to ¥12,500, and use the price increase as the moment to tighten yield - buy whole fish where possible and send head, bones and collar to stock. Option B alone trades trust for about ¥100 a cover, and it is the option guests notice most and complain about least, which is the worst combination.
3. How do you communicate the change to regulars and to the team without damaging trust?
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To regulars. Communicate before they arrive, not at the table. A short personal note or email to booked guests explains that landings of madai have tightened, that the tai course is staying at the same size, and that the menu price moves to ¥12,500 from a stated date. Give a clear effective date so nobody feels the price changed underneath them. For price-sensitive regulars, offer the option of the shorter menu or a different date, rather than quietly discounting for some and not others.
To the team. Brief them with the numbers, not just the instruction. Servers should be able to say in one sentence why the price moved, and should not improvise explanations at the table. The kitchen should hear the same message: the portion is unchanged, the fish is unchanged, and the price is the lever we chose.
What not to do. Do not shrink the slice and keep the price, do not remove the course and pretend the menu is the same, and do not let the change appear first on the bill. Trust in a kaiseki counter is built on predictability; a clear, early, honest price change costs far less than a guest noticing that the tai got smaller.