Take the guesswork out of setting the right food and beverage salaries for your employees with industry guidelines readily available online. Salary tools consist of pay surveys, compensation reports and historical salary data that identify what employees in a given industry are earning. These tools guide restaurateurs and owners of food and beverage companies who are searching for reliable guidelines to help them attract and retain a qualified staff. Even owners of mom-and-pop stores know that if they offer competitive salaries, they're more likely to find the right people and reduce employee turnover.

Food and beverage salary guidelines are available from government agencies that collect industry data, food industry magazines that offer market forecasts to manufacturers, suppliers and retailers, as well as from online job search data bases that serve the general public. Get timely information on food and beverage industry salary tools for beginners when you access these sources:

1. Locate food and beverage salary tools that generate customized reports.

2. Get surveys and online reports of food industry salaries written exclusively for business owners.

3. Check food industry pay surveys that employees are likely to base their career choices on.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Locate food and beverage salary tools that generate customized reports

Excellent sources of food and beverage industry salary tools for beginners are websites by companies that prepare customized compensation reports. Using information you provide, these companies generate timely compensation data based upon your business' location, size and number of employees.

I recommend: PayScale understands that your business is different from others. It creates a compensation report for specific job titles that is tailored to your company. With the Salary Wizard at Salary.com, you have access to charts depicting base salary ranges for any food or beverage industry jobs in your area.

Get surveys and online reports of food industry salaries written exclusively for business owners

Some companies keep track of compensation data for many different industries (including the food and beverage industry), such as base pay, vacation policy and benefits packages. including the food and beverage industry. They offer these salary benchmarking reports to business owners who then rely on the data as they negotiate compensation for high potential food industry employees.

I recommend: Vault specializes in providing salary reports to its registered users: food business owners recruiting for positions that require professional training and experience. Pay surveys done by Food Engineering are based on questionnaires completed by the magazine's readers. These surveys offer salary outlooks for many positions in the food and beverage industry. Get the most comprehensive salary surveys from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics which provides average earnings charts for both supervisory and non-supervisory personnel in many segments of the food industry.

Review the food industry pay charts your employees base their decisions on

Knowing the compensation data that your employees and potential hires are basing their career choices on can help you match the salary to the position, making it easier for you to recruit a staff that offers the experience your business needs.

I recommend: Employees are likely to use My Plan's historical salary data to learn about position salaries based on year, national average and even to consider the effects of inflation on their pay. At CB Salary, employees can get salary reports that are based on their own educational and professional experience.

Food industry salaries – like any salary – need to stay competitive in order to keep the employees you value and recruit new staff. But what is the average food and beverage salary? Obviously, starting salaries for beverage industry jobs will be less than the pay given to long-term staff, but it’s also important to determine average food industry salaries for similar positions at other companies.

Many factors come into play when determining the average salary for jobs in the food industry. Use the following tools to establish up-to-date food and beverage salary guidelines:

1. Use food and beverage industry salary tools to help you hire new employees at a fair rate.

2. Use a food and beverage salary calculator and compensation tools during staff reviews and promotions.

3. Use national job boards to help you compare compensation and benefits for jobs in the food industry.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Determine fair food industry salaries before hiring new employees

Food and beverage salaries really run the gamut due to several factors, including job type, experience level, company size and location. Deciphering what a specific position is worth can be dizzying. Fortunately, there are a variety of food and beverage salary tools available that are easy to use and typically provide current information on food industry salaries.

I recommend: PayScale helps you find out the average pay for food and beverage industry jobs by searching by job title and location. The site also offers a glimpse at median salaries in the food and beverage industry in a handy pay chart. CBSalary.com offers similar information and searching capabilities.

Stay current on food industry salaries to keep employees happy

Offering a competitive beverage salary to a new employee is essential, but it's also important to regularly provide fair salary increases to existing staff members. At the very least, all employees should get a cost-of-living increase at review time.

I recommend: Search for the average food industry salary in your area by using Salary.com’s Salary Wizard. Compare food industry salaries between two cities with the cost-of-living calculator at Bankrate.com.

Keep employee benefits in mind when establishing a food and beverage industry salary guide

Food industry pay is not the only thing that will attract and keep employees. Benefits such as medical and dental insurance, vacation pay, life insurance, flexible hours, casual dress, stock options and more are factors for many workers. Search your local newspaper's classified section or on national job boards for real salaries and benefits for real positions. Create a log of the salaries and benefits you see over several weeks to come up with a good range to use as a basis of comparison.

I recommend: Find food and beverage industry salary and benefits information by searching for jobs on industry-specific job boards like FoodandDrinkJobs.com and on industry-wide boards such as SimplyHired.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  Professional associations, such as The Food and Beverage Association of America, provide great forums for discussing food and beverage salary and benefits expectations.

Choices abound for food and beverage industry salary tools. You can start with free salary tools for basic information to decide if you are paying fair wages. Then, full-service software opens up a greater range of choices, thanks to the many providers who offer support for their products.

If you outsource your payroll to a CPA or a company specializing in food and beverage industry salaries, take advantage of tools available from associations. Consider the following options to find the right system for your needs:

1. Use food and beverage salary tools to determine fair wages.

2. Work with vendors who offer full-service software and support.

3. Get discounts and help through associations geared to food industry occupations.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Use tools to help you set food industry salaries

Salary calculators for the food industry can help you determine pay scales for your employees. Many factors may affect wages, including your geographic location, your level of service and the type of experience or education you require.

I recommend: Work with PayScale to determine wages based on the amount of time an employee has been with your business. The Economic Research Institute Salary Survey Software offers salary tools for a variety of positions including chef, chef assistant and buttermaker.

Work with vendors offering software for food and beverage industry jobs

Many restaurant owners and managers purchase software that comes with salary tools. Opt for one of the many companies who provide at least a year of free support, in case you need help to get systems running smoothly.

I recommend: Execu/Tech Systems gives details on the features of its restaurant software, which includes back office accounting tools. Be sure to browse through the site to learn more about the company and the support it offers. Business Software Solutions has detailed descriptions of programs, support and services for its food service software, including payroll programs.

Find food and beverage salary guidelines and other tools through associations

Food industry associations offer members a variety of tools, from salary guidelines pegged to your location to discounts on payroll services. Many associations that partner with payroll companies will reveal details of their agreements, so you know what to expect before purchasing the service.

I recommend: The Pennsylvania Restaurant Association and the Restaurant Association of Maryland both give member discounts for working with a payroll processing company. Check both sites for details of their respective services. It pays to search for similar associations in your own geographic area for comparable deals.

The food and beverage industry covers a variety of positions including fast food chain workers, restaurant workers, corporate positions and vending machine companies. Using food and beverage industry salary tools key terms in the hiring and record-keeping process helps ensure fair payment.

Business owners might use food and beverage industry salary tools key terms to manipulate software programs and other tools that base salary results on the national average. They might also use them to factor in position type and geographic location.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Salary calculator

A salary calculator is an application one finds online that provides information on salaries within an industry.

I recommend: PayScale offers a salary calculator for those interested in various jobs in the food industry.

Cost of living

Some salary tools factor in cost of living, which is the average cost for basic necessities (such as clothing, shelter and food) in a particular area. Salary tools factor in the cost of living because incomes should be higher in areas where the cost of living is higher.

I recommend: PAQ Services offers a comparison of a fine dining restaurant manager compared to other occupations. It addresses cost of living data and offers website users the options to compare the cost of living in two locations.

Download

Some food and beverage industry salary tools come in a downloadable format. This means that one can transfer a certain type of program or file from a main computer to another computer in a remote location.

I recommend: FileBuzz Download Center offers various tapes of software that users may download to work with restaurant salaries. Some of the downloads keep track of payments and offer reports of salaries in restaurant operations.

Salary surveys

Salary surveys are a collection of market and salary data including average salaries, cost of living indicators and inflation factors in salary budget averages.

I recommend: Economic Research Institute (ERI) offers a good explanation detailing how to use a food and beverage manufacturing salary survey tool.

National average salary

Also called the national average wage, the national average salary is a term for the median salary of a nation's working population.

I recommend: StarChefs discusses the change of the national average wages for various categories in the food industry.

Food and beverage job board

A food and beverage job board is a useful tool for those looking for employment in the business.

I recommend: Kijiji International offers a tool that compares salaries for particular types of jobs in the food and beverage industry.