Restaurant types
Full-service restaurant costs: targets and 2024 medians
By Felix S. Pavel · Updated · 7 min read
In a full-service restaurant, servers take the order at the table and bring it out. That service is paid hours, so labor takes a bigger share of each dollar than at a counter, and every other target moves with it. Here are the targets RestaurantDoctorAI uses for full service and casual dining, what full-service restaurants reported for 2024, and where the money usually goes.
The quick answer
Healthy targets for a full-service restaurant: prime cost 65% or less, food and drink 30–34%, labor 30–35%, and rent and utilities 12% or less of sales.
Prime cost % = (food and drink cost + labor cost) ÷ net sales × 100
| Full service | RestaurantDoctorAI's target |
|---|---|
| Prime cost | 65% or less |
| Food and drink | 30–34% |
| Labor, payroll taxes and benefits in | 30–35% |
| Rent and utilities | 12% or less |
The typical full-service restaurant kept 2.8 cents of each sales dollar before taxes in 2024, and 1.1 cents if it sold under $2 million a year (National Restaurant Association). The targets are the ones the free profit check grades against.
Our targets beside the 2024 medians
The National Restaurant Association (NRA) surveyed more than 900 restaurants for its 2025 Restaurant Operations Data Abstract, on 2024. Its free pages give these medians for full service. The second column is ours.
| Line | RestaurantDoctorAI's target | NRA 2024 median | Split by the NRA |
|---|---|---|---|
| Prime cost | 65% or less | Not published free | — |
| Food and drink | 30–34% | 32.0% (food and soft drinks) | 31.0% at $2M+, 33.7% under |
| Labor | 30–35% | 36.5% | 34.2% if profitable, 42.9% at a loss |
| Rent and utilities | 12% or less | 5.7% | 6.0% in cities, 5.5% in suburbs |
| Pretax income | No target | 2.8% | 4.3% at $2M+, 1.1% under |
Prime cost. The NRA doesn't publish a free full-service prime cost median. Our 65% ceiling is the line RestaurantOwner.com gives for table service: prime cost “no more than 65 percent of total sales.”
Labor. The top of our range, 35%, sits just above the 34.2% median of full-service restaurants that made a profit. The median across all of them, 36.5%, is over it: the typical full-service restaurant misses this target, and the ones that lost money ran 42.9%. Labor is where profit and loss split.
Rent and utilities. We print a ceiling, 12% or less, not a range. The NRA's median was 5.7%, but its page doesn't say what the figure counts, and ours counts rent, charges on top of rent and utilities together. Under the ceiling is fine, however low. Above it, rent squeezes profit.
Why full-service numbers online disagree
Before you compare your numbers with one you read, check what it counts. Four things move it:
- Alcohol. The NRA's food figure leaves alcohol out. Our food and drink target counts it in. Where a full-service restaurant serves alcohol, it averaged 21% of total sales, the NRA told a federal regulator in 2023 (its comments). So the two figures measure different things.
- What counts as labor. The NRA's labor medians include benefits. Our targets include payroll taxes and benefits. A figure for wages alone reads lower than either.
- Sales volume. Full-service restaurants selling $2 million or more a year ran food at 31.0% and kept 4.3% before taxes. Under $2 million: 33.7% and 1.1%. A national figure blends both.
- Vendor ranges. Software and payment companies publish their own ranges. Restaurant365, a software vendor, says full-service margins “can fall into the 3-5% profit margin range” and names no survey. Treat a range with no source as a guess.
An example month, worked through
This is an example, not an average: one full-service restaurant with $90,000 in sales a month, food and drink at 32%, inside the 30–34% range, and labor at the NRA's 36.5% median.
- Net sales
- $90,000
- Food and drink, 32%
- $28,800
- + Labor, 36.5%
- $32,850
- = Prime cost, 68.5%
- $61,650
- Ceiling at 65% of sales
- $58,500
That's $37,800 a year, and all of it is labor: food and drink is inside its range. With labor at 33%, inside its range too, prime cost would be 65%, right at the ceiling. Each point of sales here is $900 a month.
Where full-service restaurants lose money
Each of these is common at full service. Each has one first fix and one tool or guide for it.
Labor that doesn't flex with the room
Servers, runners, bussers and hosts are scheduled for the covers you expect. A slow night still pays for all of them. Profitable full-service restaurants ran labor at 34.2% of sales; loss-making ones, 42.9%. The fix: set a cut line, the sales per labor hour below which the first person goes home, and check it on the hour. How to set your cut line.
Tipped wages that rise by law
Tipped staff are a full-service cost a counter barely has, and state and city minimums change on set dates. The fix: work out what the next raise costs a year before it lands, and price for it. Tipped minimum wage by state, with a raise calculator.
Sales too low for the fixed costs
Full-service restaurants under $2 million in sales kept a median 1.1% before taxes, against 4.3% for bigger ones. A dining room's rent and salaried staff cost the same on a quiet week. The fix: know the sales a month needs to pay every bill, and the covers a day that takes. Break-even calculator.
Plate costs that drift up between menu changes
Full-service menu prices rose 3.5% in the year to August 2026, against 2.2% for groceries (Bureau of Labor Statistics). With prices already up, a price rise is a poor fix for a recipe nobody has re-costed. The fix: re-cost your five best sellers with this month's supplier prices before you change a price. Plate cost calculator.
Drinks poured by eye
Alcohol averaged 21% of sales where full-service restaurants serve it. Free pours and unrung drinks come straight off that line. The fix: measure every pour with a jigger, and count the bar each week. How to work out and fix pour cost.
Rent set for a busier year
A lease doesn't move when sales do. Above 12% of sales, rent and utilities squeeze profit. The fix: work out your share on last month's sales, and the sales your rent needs, before the lease comes up. How much rent a restaurant can afford.
Tipped wages: the full-service line item
Under the federal rule, an employer may pay tipped staff a cash wage of $2.13 an hour and count up to $5.12 of their tips toward the $7.25 minimum, if tips make up the difference. Staff count as tipped when they get more than $30 a month in tips. Many states set more. These states require the full minimum before tips, so there's no tip credit at all:
- Alaska: $14.00 an hour before tips.
- California: $16.90 an hour before tips. A higher city or county minimum comes first.
- Minnesota: $11.41 an hour before tips.
- Montana: $10.85 an hour before tips. For businesses with yearly sales over $110,000. Smaller businesses the federal law doesn't cover: $4.00.
- Nevada: $12.00 an hour before tips.
- Oregon: $15.55 an hour before tips. Standard rate. Portland metro: $16.80. Nonurban counties: $14.55.
- Washington: $17.13 an hour before tips.
From the US Department of Labor's table of tipped minimum wages (revised July 1, 2026), checked on October 10, 2026. A city can set more than its state. Check your state's labor office before you change pay.
Questions full-service owners ask
What is a good profit margin for a full-service restaurant?
The median full-service restaurant kept 2.8% of sales before taxes in 2024: 4.3% at $2 million or more in sales, 1.1% under it, by the NRA's figures. Prime cost under 65% is what leaves room for one.
Is 36% labor too high for a full-service restaurant?
It's over our 30–35% range and close to the NRA's 36.5% median for all full-service restaurants. Profitable ones ran 34.2%. If food and drink is low, prime cost can still come in under 65%, so check the two together.
What is the 30/30/30 rule for restaurants?
A rule of thumb with no published source: 30% of sales to food and drink, 30% to labor, 30% to everything else. At full service it rarely holds. The NRA's labor median alone was 36.5%. How the rule compares with real restaurants.
Is a 32% food cost good for a full-service restaurant?
Yes, it's inside our 30–34% range for food and drink, and the NRA's median for food and soft drinks was 32.0%. A good food cost still needs labor inside its range to keep prime cost under 65%.
Is casual dining the same as full service?
In the free check, yes: “Full service / casual dining” means servers and a moderate check. Fine dining, chef-driven with a higher check, has its own targets, which are on the restaurant types page.
Check your own numbers
Two free calculators for the numbers on this page. No sign-up.
Free calculatorLabor cost calculatorLabor as a share of sales, payroll taxes and benefits in, against the 30–35% range, plus your cut line.Free calculatorBreak-even calculatorThe sales a month needs to pay every bill, and the covers a day that takes.Want every leak with its dollar estimate and a plan? See what the full report adds.
RestaurantDoctorAI's targets are its own; the medians beside them are the National Restaurant Association's, linked where they're quoted. General information, not financial, tax or legal advice.