Day-end shrink

Definition

What is baked and not sold, the loss that decides a bakery's margin more than price does.

Why It Matters

Everything on the shelf at close was paid for in flour, labor, and oven time, so a shop running high shrink is buying its own display case every day. It rarely appears as a line anywhere. Ask what is produced against what is rung up, whether anything is donated or discounted at the end of the day, and how production is planned, because a bakery that bakes to a fixed recipe card rather than to yesterday's sales has an unmanaged cost sitting in plain sight.