A new café's opening week: schedule, daily numbers and review

This is the last part of our 7-part series Opening a café: from idea to first day. Earlier: the concept, the location, the menu, the equipment, food safety and the last 30 days.

The first week is when the plan meets real guests. You'll learn more about your café in seven days than in the months before, but only if you write it down. By day three the days start to blur, and a week later nobody remembers whether the milk ran out on Tuesday or Wednesday.

This post covers the opening-week schedule, the numbers to record every day and how to use them. For the soft opening, opening day and giveaways, see our grand opening plan; this post picks up from there.

Carry the soft opening's lessons in

Before the first full day, go back to the soft opening's notes: the slow drinks, the empty shelves, the questions nobody could answer. Fix what you can, and for what you can't, decide who handles it during service. Then start a fresh notebook (or a log) for opening week.

The schedule for opening week

You have no sales history yet, so the schedule is a guess. Make it a careful one:

Staff the peak above your guess. One more person than you think the busiest hours need, on bar or as a runner restocking milk, cups and lids.
Stagger the starts. Overlap people at the peak instead of scheduling everyone for the whole day.
Short shifts for new people. A new barista's first full shift shouldn't also be the busiest of the week.
A person in charge on every shift. Named on the schedule, with a certified food protection manager on site when your rule asks for one. See part 5.
Days off for everyone, including you. Plan them before the week starts. Our first staff schedule guide covers the basics, and the weekly grid template has a layout.
An on-call list. Two people who agreed to come in if the line gets long.
Watch the hours. Long opening weeks are how a new team ends up in overtime. Know your state's rules, and check the totals before you publish.

After day three, you'll know roughly when the rushes come. Adjust the second half of the week then, rather than waiting for week two.

Eight numbers to write down every day

You don't need a dashboard in week one. You need the same few numbers, written down at the same time every day, so you can compare days. Most come from your POS; a few you count by hand.

#	Number	Where it comes from	What it tells you
1	Sales by hour	POS report	When the rushes really are
2	Number of transactions and the average ticket	POS report	Whether people add food or a second drink
3	Ticket-to-handoff time at the peak	Time 10 orders with a stopwatch during the busiest hour	Whether you're keeping the speed promise in your concept
4	What sold out, and when	The shift lead's note	Your first real par levels
5	Waste	A waste log at close	Over-ordering, over-prepping or a quality problem
6	Remakes	A tally at the bar	Training gaps and confusing items. See order accuracy and remakes
7	Labor hours and labor cost against sales	The time clock and the POS	Whether the schedule fits the sales. See labor cost percentage
8	Cash over or short	The end-of-day count	Whether cash handling works. See the daily sales and cash report

Add two yes-or-no checks: were the opening and closing checklists finished, and were the temperatures logged? A busy first week is when those slip, and they're what the inspector looks for.

About the numbers: there's no standard opening-week target for any of them. A café's first week isn't a normal week, either: friends, curiosity and opening offers can lift it, and a new team is slower than it will be in a month. Use the numbers to compare days and to spot problems, not to judge the business yet.

A ten-minute review after close

Hold a short review at the end of each day with whoever closed, and write the answers down:

What ran out, and when?
Which items slowed the line?
What did guests ask that nobody could answer?
What broke, or nearly did?
What's the one fix for tomorrow, and who owns it?

One fix a day, with a name next to it, gets done. Ten fixes a day don't.

What to listen to

Numbers don't capture everything. During the week, also note:

Guest comments, especially the same comment from different people. A simple feedback card helps. See the feedback card and QR survey template.
Reviews. Reply to every one, and look for patterns. See your first 50 Google reviews.
Your team. Ask each person once during the week what's hardest about their station. They see the problems you don't.

At the end of the week: what to change, and what not to

On day seven, lay the eight numbers side by side and read back the nightly notes. Then decide:

Change now: pars for anything that sold out or was thrown away, the staffing at hours that were clearly over or under, the station setup that slowed the line, and the training for any repeated remake.
Watch for another week or two: opening hours, menu items that sold slowly, and prices. Opening week sales aren't typical, and changing too much at once makes it hard to tell what worked.
Write down for later: ideas for new items, longer hours or catering. Come back to them once the basics run without you.

Then hand the numbers and the notes to the next stage. Our first 90 days playbook picks up from week two, with the schedule rhythm, the first inventory counts, labor % and training.

Common mistakes

Not writing anything down. The week blurs, and the lessons with it.
Changing the menu on day two. One slow morning isn't a pattern.
Working every shift yourself. You'll miss what happens when you're not there, and you'll be exhausted by week two.
Cutting staff too early. A new team needs more people than an experienced one for the same sales.

Where Mays fits

The schedule as drafts, then published. Build opening week on the schedule grid, check the overtime warnings while you build, then publish; the team sees their shifts in the iOS and Android apps. Add an open shift for the extra pair of hands at the peak. See Building the weekly schedule.
Sales and labor together, once the POS is connected. With Square or Union connected, Insights → Labor Cost shows labor as a share of sales for every half hour of the day, and scheduled against actual hours. Scheduling → Reports → Actuals lists sales, labor and labor % per day. See Labor cost insights.
The forecast, from week two on. The Forecast page projects each day's sales from the same weekday in past weeks of your POS history, so it needs a few weeks of sales before it says much. In opening week you'll be working from the numbers above. See Sales forecast and labor budget.
Waste with a reason. Inventory → Waste logs each item thrown away with a reason, such as Prepared too much, and takes it out of stock. See Logging waste.
The nightly review, kept. Write each night's answers in the manager Logbook under the day, and tick Needs follow-up on the fix for tomorrow. See The manager logbook.

Your opening week checklist

The soft opening's lessons fixed or assigned
A schedule with extra hands at the peak, staggered starts, short shifts for new people, a person in charge and days off
Eight numbers written down every day, plus checklists and temperatures
A ten-minute review after close, with one fix and one owner
Guest comments, reviews and the team's view noted
On day seven: change pars, staffing and setup; watch hours, menu and prices

Open with a plan, then learn from week one

That's the series, from the idea to the first week. To run opening week with the schedule, checklists and numbers in one place, start your free trial: 30 days, every module, no card needed. Or book a walkthrough and we'll set up your first weeks with you.