How to spot supplier price increases and pack size changes

To spot a supplier price increase, compare the unit price on each delivery with the last delivery of the same item. Then check the pack size, because a vendor can keep the case price the same and put less in the case.

Unit price means the price per pound, per ounce or per each. You work it out from the case price and what is inside the case.

Most price increases at a restaurant are small. A case of chicken goes up $2.40 this week and another $2.40 a few weeks later. A case of cheese keeps its price while the bags inside get smaller. Owners call this price creep. Each increase is small, and the increases are spread across many deliveries and many items. You won't catch it by reading case prices, because each change is too small to stand out on an invoice with 40 lines.

This guide shows the method with a spreadsheet and the invoices you already get. At the end there is a checklist you can print.

Price creep hides inside the case price

Here is one item, boneless chicken thighs in a 40 lb case, from Heartland Foodservice (a made-up vendor) over eight weeks.

No single delivery looks alarming. Over eight weeks the case went up $7.20, which is 7.8%. If you buy three cases a week, you now pay $21.60 more every week for the same chicken. That is about $1,120 a year on one item.

Prices also move differently from item to item. The USDA's Economic Research Service forecasts wholesale beef prices to rise 8.5% in 2026, while farm-level egg prices are forecast to fall 79.2% (Food Price Outlook, updated September 25, 2026, as of 2026-10-09). A national inflation number can't tell you what happened to your fryer oil last Tuesday. You have to watch your own items.

Shrinkflation means the same case price for less food

Shrinkflation is when the amount in a package goes down and the price stays where it was. The U.S. Government Accountability Office describes it as an item's quantity decreasing "without a commensurate price drop" (GAO-25-107451, July 31, 2025, as of 2026-10-09).

It is harder to see than a price increase. The number most people check, the case price, doesn't move.

Here is shredded mozzarella from Riverside Dairy (also made up).

"4/5 LB" means four bags of 5 pounds each. The case price is $72.00 both times. The price per pound went up 11.1%.

Pack changes usually show up in one of these places:

• The pack column on the invoice. "4/5 LB" becomes "4/4.5 LB", or "200 CT" becomes "180 CT" (CT means count, the number of pieces).
• A new item number for what looks like the same product. The item number is the vendor's code for a product, often called a SKU.
• The description on a vendor's price sheet.
• The count on items sold by the piece, like burger patties and to-go lids. A case of 40 becomes a case of 36.

The government handles this the same way when it measures inflation. For items with a reported size, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics calculates "an effective price per standard size, usually a price per ounce" (Beyond the Numbers, February 2, 2023, as of 2026-10-09). A smaller package at the same price counts as a price increase. Do the same in your kitchen.

The two formulas you need

Unit price = case price ÷ (packs in the case × size of each pack)

Change % = (this delivery's unit price − last delivery's unit price) ÷ last delivery's unit price × 100

With the mozzarella: $72.00 ÷ (4 × 4.5 lb) = $4.00 per lb. Then ($4.00 − $3.60) ÷ $3.60 × 100 = 11.1%.

For catch-weight items, use the price per pound printed on the invoice. Catch weight means the case is sold by its actual weight. Every case of brisket weighs a little different, so the case total changes even when the price per pound stays the same.

A weekly check you can run with a spreadsheet

1. Pick your top 20 items

Take last month's invoices and add up what you spent on each item. Sort from most to least and keep the top 20. Proteins, cheese, fryer oil, fries and to-go packaging often land on this list.

Check what share of your total food spend those 20 items cover. If it is less than half, add items until it is more than half. Nobody can watch 300 items by hand. Twenty is a list you can keep up with.

Copy these columns into a spreadsheet:

2. Work out the unit price on every delivery

When an invoice arrives, find your top-20 lines. Copy the pack exactly as it is printed, work out the units per case, and divide the case price by it. Compare the result with the last delivery of the same item from the same vendor.

Mark anything that went up 5% or more. Five percent is a reasonable place to start. Lower it for your most expensive items if you like.

Use the delivered price, meaning the price on the invoice you pay. A price quoted on the phone or shown on a website is useful for comparing vendors, but the invoice is what leaves your bank account.

3. Check every price sheet the same way

Many produce and meat vendors email a price sheet every week. Read the pack column before the price column, and compare it with last week's sheet for your top 20. A new item number on a product you have bought for years deserves a closer look.

4. Check the pack first when a jump is very large

If an item's unit price more than doubled, or fell by more than half, the invoice probably shows a different pack. Common causes are a split case (the vendor sold you one bag instead of a full case), a substitute in a different size, or a pack written in a different unit.

For example, last time you ordered one 5 lb bag of shredded cheddar as a split case for $18.50. This time you got the full case of four bags for $72.00. Line to line, the price looks up 289%. Per pound, it went from $3.70 to $3.60, which is down 2.7%.

Treat any move above +100% or below −50% as a pack question until you have looked at the box or the invoice. Keep those items off your "price up" list until then. Otherwise a +289% line sits at the top and pushes the real increases out of sight.

Write down every agreed price

If a rep promised you a price, put it in writing. That includes a contract price, which is a price the vendor agrees to hold for a set period. An agreed price only protects you if someone checks deliveries against it. Keep a short list like this one:

Save the email or the signed sheet next to it. On each delivery, compare the delivered unit price with the agreed price. If the delivered price is higher, ask for a credit (money taken off your next bill) and write down the date you asked.

What to do when you find an increase

Ask your rep

Ask what changed and whether it will last. Weather and market swings can push up produce and proteins for a few weeks and then ease. Ask whether another brand or pack is still at the old price. Get the answer in an email so you can check it later.

Price it at another vendor

Put the other vendor's price on the same unit before you compare. Count their minimum order and delivery fee too. Our guide on how to compare food vendor prices walks through it.

Re-cost the plate

Plate cost change = amount used per plate × change in unit price

A pizza uses 6 oz of mozzarella, which is 0.375 lb. At $3.60 a pound the cheese cost $1.35. At $4.00 it costs $1.50. Each pizza now costs 15 cents more to make. At 600 pizzas a month, that is $90 a month.

Food cost % is plate cost ÷ menu price × 100. A $16.00 pizza that cost $4.00 to make had a 25% food cost. At $4.15, it is 25.9%. For the full method, see how to cost a recipe.

Change the menu price or the portion

Menu price that keeps your food cost % = new plate cost ÷ target food cost %

For the pizza, $4.15 ÷ 0.25 = $16.60.

You can also trim the portion. At $4.00 a pound, 5.5 oz of mozzarella costs about $1.38, close to the old $1.35. Make a test pizza and look at it before you change the recipe card.

For a sudden produce spike, wait one or two more deliveries before you touch the menu. If the price holds, act on it.

A checklist to print

• [ ] Top-20 list updated this month
• [ ] Every top-20 delivery: pack copied as printed, unit price worked out
• [ ] Anything up 5% or more since the last delivery marked
• [ ] Moves above +100% or below −50% checked as a pack question first
• [ ] Price sheets: pack column compared with last week's
• [ ] Delivered prices checked against agreed prices, and credits asked for
• [ ] Increases that held for two deliveries: rep asked, another vendor priced, plate re-costed

How RestaurantMate runs this check for you

RestaurantMate reads each invoice it receives and works out the unit price of each delivered line from the vendor's own pack information. When a pack size is missing, it asks you once instead of guessing. Invoices from vendor websites are pulled daily. For vendors that only email you, PDF invoices and price sheets come in through your RestaurantMate inbox (yourname@mail.rmate.ai) once you list the sender as a vendor rep.

On the Inventory page, each item shows its unit price at the last delivery and a Change column against the delivery before. Set the Show filter to Price up at last delivery to see only the items that went up.

Moves above +100% or below −50% are marked Check pack and kept out of the price-up counts. They have their own filter, Price moved too far to trust, so you can open each one and check its deliveries.

The Coach page has a Price watch section that lists price moves of 5% or more on what you buy. See Coach and weekly reports.

An alert can email you when a price goes up. Start from the preset Price up more than 5%. Or attach a vendor's price sheet (CSV, Excel or PDF) and tell it to watch for prices above it. RestaurantMate emails you when a delivered price is over the prices on the sheet. Alerts are checked every 10 minutes, so they are not instant, and they arrive by email. See Alerts.

When you find an increase, open the item to see every vendor's price for it on the same unit. See vendor price comparison.

RestaurantMate is free for 60 days, then $99 a month per location. No card required to start.

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Sources

• USDA Economic Research Service, Food Price Outlook, summary findings, updated September 25, 2026 (as of 2026-10-09).
• U.S. Government Accountability Office, Consumer Prices: Trends and Policy Options Related to Shrinking Product Sizes (GAO-25-107451), July 31, 2025 (as of 2026-10-09).
• U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Measuring shrinkflation and its impact on inflation, Beyond the Numbers, vol. 12, no. 2, February 2, 2023 (as of 2026-10-09).