Precision Food Sales Forecasting and Revenue Optimisation for a Fast Food Restaurant Chain

The operations team faced a common but high-impact challenge: how to meet customer demand with the right team and the right stock — without over-prepping, overstaffing, or relying on guesswork.

Key issues included:

SolvedBy.Ai implemented two connected AI forecasting models, each designed to address a core operational challenge.

1. Hourly Sales Forecasting per Site
The model predicts how much each restaurant will sell, hour by hour. This allows the chain to align staffing levels with demand, reducing overstaffing during quiet times and ensuring sufficient coverage during peak hours — both front of house and in kitchens.

2. Hourly Sales Forecasting per SKU
By forecasting demand for individual menu items each hour, the business can prepare the right quantities, minimising waste, especially for hot food with short shelf life.

What began as a hypothesis — that smarter forecasting could reduce waste, improve staffing, and increase profit — quickly proved out in the numbers.

In one standout week, a flagship central London store achieved record sales by following the AI-driven forecast as closely as possible. This demonstrated that intelligent forecasting drives both operational excellence and revenue growth.

The fast food restaurant chain now:

The proof of concept delivered clear, measurable results:

A fast food restaurant chain with more than 40 locations across the UK set out to transform its operational planning and profitability. Founded in the early 2000s, the business has grown rapidly, combining high-street restaurants and delivery kitchens to serve fresh, ready-to-go meals to a broad customer base.

Its menu includes a mix of made-ahead cold dishes and short-shelf-life hot meals — a combination that creates unique challenges for production and staffing. Manual planning made it difficult to match demand in real time, leading to inefficiencies in both food preparation and labour allocation.

SolvedBy.Ai partnered with the chain to streamline planning through AI-powered sales forecasting and labour optimisation, improving efficiency and reducing waste.

“With SolvedBy.Ai, we’ve moved from instinct-led planning to data-driven decision-making. The forecasting models have given us visibility and control across every site and SKU — unlocking commercial opportunities we couldn’t see before and delivering measurable impact to both our top and bottom line.”
— Senior Commercial Manager, Fast Food Restaurant Chain