For Restaurant Owner-Operators ·
What you'll accomplish
Each time you ask an AI for help with a big decision, you start by explaining your restaurant again. A Claude Project fixes that. You set it up once with a short description of the business, a few rounded monthly P&Ls and your own rules of thumb. After that, every chat inside it starts with the same background, and your monthly review becomes a ten-minute routine instead of a blank-page problem.
What you'll need
What goes in and what stays out. Use rounded financials. Round every figure so the exact cents do not matter, and leave out bank account numbers, your EIN, loan account numbers and card data. Replace staff names with roles such as "GM" or "sous chef", and leave out pay rates tied to a person. Partner and investor terms stay out unless you have decided this assistant may see them. Check Claude's privacy and data settings in your account to see how your chats may be used, and set that once for the whole business.
Write one page in plain words. Cover the type of restaurant, number of seats, days and hours, the kind of guests you serve, your sales channels (dine-in, takeout, delivery, catering), how many people work for you by role, and what you are trying to do this year. Keep it factual.
What you should see: A short document you could hand to a new advisor. Troubleshooting: If you get stuck, speak it into your phone's voice notes and clean it up later.
What you should see: Three to six small files, one per month, with no personal detail. Troubleshooting: Use the same line names in each month so Claude can compare them.
List the ways you judge your own business. Examples: which numbers you check weekly, what level of cash you want on hand, what makes you drop a menu item, how you decide on a price change. Use your own words and your own numbers. Do not copy figures from articles or from other owners, because a rule that works for another concept may mislead you.
What you should see: A half-page list with your own thresholds.
What you should see: An empty project page with a knowledge area on the right side. Troubleshooting: If the layout looks different, look for a Projects link in the sidebar or menu. Interfaces change.
What you should see: Every file listed in the knowledge area. Troubleshooting: If a PDF will not read properly, paste its text into a text file instead.
Click Set project instructions, paste the text below, edit it, and click Save instructions.
You are an advisor who knows my restaurant from the project files. Use the files for facts. If a number is not in the files, ask me for it instead of assuming. Use plain words and short sentences. When you explain a number, say where in the files it comes from. Do not state industry averages or benchmarks. Compare me with my own history and my rules of thumb. When a question involves taxes, legal matters, a lease, a loan or insurance, give me questions for my accountant, attorney or insurance agent instead of an answer. End each review with three things to ask my accountant.
What you should see: The instructions saved on the project page. Troubleshooting: Claude's help page notes that context is not shared between chats unless it is in the project knowledge. If something matters next month, add it to a file.
What you should see: An answer that names the files it used, with figures that match your P&Ls.
Monthly review routine
Here is this month's rounded P&L. Compare it to the last three months in the project. List the three line items that moved most, what I should look at in my own records to understand each one, and one decision I should consider.
Rule-of-thumb check
Check this month against the rules of thumb in the project. Which ones am I within, and which ones am I outside? Do not add new rules.
Big decision prep
I am considering [decision]. Using the files, list what I would need to know before deciding, what numbers I would want from my accountant, and what could go wrong. Do not recommend a choice.
Update the knowledge
Based on this chat, write a short update for my business description file that I can paste in. Only include facts I told you in this chat.