The money
Food and packaging cost is typically around 25-33% of sales, with labour in a similar range. Franchisees pay royalties and marketing fund contributions, typically a combined percentage of sales in the high single digits or more, plus rent. Speed of service and drive-through throughput are the key revenue drivers. Margins depend heavily on volume, so a site needs high transaction counts per hour. Technology like kiosks and apps aims to raise average transaction value and reduce till labour.
Numbers that matter
- Transactions per hour
- orders served at peak
- Speed of service
- seconds from order to hand-over
- Average transaction value
- spend per order
- Food and paper cost %
- ingredients and packaging share
- Labour %
- crew cost as a share of sales
- Drive-through car count
- vehicles served per hour
What keeps owners up
- Minimum wage rises and scheduling rules
- Public health regulation on menus and advertising
- Franchisee profitability squeezed by royalties
- Packaging and waste regulation
- Safety and abuse of young staff
- Automation changing crew roles
What we talk about
- Crew to franchisee: real career paths in fast food
- Kiosks, AI drive-throughs and what they mean for jobs
- Young workers, safeguarding and late shifts
- The franchisee's view of the royalty model
- Speed versus wellbeing at the peak
- Independent takeaways and the high street