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What is the daily sales benchmark?

The daily sales benchmark gives you a near real-time look at how other restaurants in your region are performing compared to yours. We built this feature after getting overwhelmingly positive feedback on our weekly benchmark emails. (Note: this feature is not yet available for Canadian clients.)
Want to adjust how you view your sales data? Check out Sales Comparison View - By Week and Year.

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How do I read the data?

The benchmark values show how the group performed over the same time frame as your restaurant. So in this example, your Thursday performance vs. last week was +0.4%, while the benchmark group came in at -1.6%. You’re outpacing the group week-over-week. On the flip side, your year-over-year number was -58.7% compared to -38.8% for the benchmark, meaning you’re trailing the group on that measure. The real value here is context. A +5% week feels good on its own, but it’s even better when everyone else is sitting at +2%.

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Are you sharing my sales data?

No. We will never share any individual restaurant’s performance data. We also make sure that every benchmark group has enough locations so that no single restaurant’s numbers can be reverse-engineered from the data.

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What other restaurants are in my benchmark group? How many are there?

Every active Garde restaurant in your geographic region that shares your Full Service or Fast Casual designation. The exact number varies, but we always make sure there are enough restaurants to keep the comparison meaningful — and to protect individual privacy.

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What is the exact definition of my geographic region?

For larger multi-state regions, we use the US Census Regions. For state-level benchmarks, we use the state your restaurant is located in. For metro-area breakdowns, we use a standard definition based on zip codes. As more clients join Garde, we’ll be able to create smaller, more granular regions and will automatically show you data for the most specific geography available. You can see your current region listed under the chart in the email.

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How do you define Full Service vs. Fast Casual? What if I’m a bit of both?

We go with the standard definition: full service means guests sit down, order, and are served at their table. We know there are plenty of in-between concepts (conveyor belt sushi, anyone?), and in those cases we use our best judgment. If you think your restaurant is categorized incorrectly, let us know and we’ll fix it.

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Why are the benchmark values in the software sometimes different from those in the email?

Sales data from restaurants across the country comes in at different times throughout the morning. The email uses whatever data is available when it’s sent. The software always reflects the most recently available data, so the numbers may shift slightly.

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Why are the benchmark values for two days ago different this morning than they were yesterday?

Same idea. If a restaurant is having POS issues, we might not get their sales data until a day or two later. Once it comes in, we include it to give you the largest possible sample size — but that can nudge the numbers a bit.

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How do you account for stores opening and closing?

For a restaurant to be included on any given day, it needs sales data for both the current date and the corresponding comparison date (last week or last year). If either is missing, we remove that restaurant from the comparison so that both sides are looking at the same group.