Key Takeaways for UK Hospitality Teams
- UK hospitality margins are under pressure from rising food prices and manual invoice processing, with 10 to 20 hours lost weekly on spreadsheets.
- Essential features now include automated invoice scanning, real-time price alerts, live dish costing, POS integrations, and multi-site dashboards.
- Jelly leads for growing restaurants, pubs, and hotels with one-week onboarding, £129 per month pricing, and proven 3% cost reductions.
- Competitors like MarketMan and Nory suit enterprises but lack Jelly’s simplicity, UK focus, and immediate real-time margin tracking.
- Transform supplier management with Jelly’s automation, and book a free demo today for rapid ROI.
Top 5 Cloud-Based Supplier Management Solutions for UK Hospitality
#1 Jelly: Best for Growing Restaurants, Pubs & Boutique Hotels
Jelly stands out as a simple cloud-based supplier management platform built specifically for UK hospitality businesses with £500k or more in annual revenue. The platform automates invoice scanning via email or photo upload and converts every line item into digital data. Teams gain instant insights without manual data entry or late-night spreadsheet work.
Jelly’s Price Alert feature flags every supplier price increase or decrease and gives operators clear evidence for negotiations and credit claims. The Flash GP report delivers real-time gross profit margins by integrating with POS systems such as Square and ePOSnow. The Kitchen section supports three-minute dish costing, compared with the industry average of 28 minutes in spreadsheets.
Multi-site operators use centralised dashboards to see performance across all locations, and they avoid per-user fees as teams grow. This structure keeps costs predictable while still giving managers and chefs access to the same live numbers.
Pros: One-week onboarding, flat £129 per month per location pricing, automated Xero integration, real-time margin tracking, UK-focused support
Cons: Limited to the hospitality sector, newer platform compared with some enterprise alternatives
Jelly users report strong financial gains. Cairn Lodge Hotel reduced food costs by 5% in one month, and The Howard Arms reached 80% gross profit margins. Across the customer base, Jelly delivers an average 3% cost reduction and a 2 percentage point margin improvement within three months. Book a free Jelly demo to see price alerts in action today.
#2 MarketMan: Best for Multi-Branch Inventory Control
MarketMan provides comprehensive inventory management with recipe costing tools and supplier integrations. The platform supports automated ordering workflows and basic invoice processing. These features suit restaurant groups that already run structured procurement processes and have teams comfortable with more complex systems.
Pros: Established platform, inventory forecasting, recipe management
Cons: Complex setup process, higher per-user costs, limited UK-specific features, longer onboarding timeline
MarketMan handles multi-location inventory effectively, yet it does not offer Jelly’s real-time price alerts or its simplified onboarding approach that many UK hospitality operators prefer.
#3 Nory: Best for Centralised Ordering Workflows
Nory focuses on centralised purchasing workflows with POS integrations and approval systems. The platform suits larger hospitality groups that employ dedicated procurement teams and manage complex approval hierarchies. These organisations often prioritise control and compliance over speed of setup.
Pros: Centralised ordering, workflow automation, established client base
Cons: Enterprise-level complexity, lengthy implementation, higher costs for smaller operations
Nory delivers strong workflow management but sacrifices simplicity. Growing venues that need quick wins and immediate value often find the system heavy and slow to roll out.
#4 Kitchen Cut: Best for Established Legacy Chains
Kitchen Cut serves established restaurant chains that rely on static reporting and traditional procurement features. The platform offers basic invoice processing and cost tracking for operators with dedicated back-office teams. These teams usually handle reporting and data entry as part of their daily workload.
Pros: Proven with large chains, comprehensive reporting
Cons: High implementation costs, static pricing data, requires dedicated staff, limited real-time capabilities
Kitchen Cut follows a legacy approach that lacks dynamic, real-time updates. Modern hospitality businesses that want agile decision-making often require faster data and more flexible reporting.
#5 Excel and Manual Processes: Biggest Risk for Scaling
Manual spreadsheet processes lead to data entry errors, inaccurate stock levels, and lost visibility on supplier performance. Growing hospitality businesses often lose 10 to 20 hours every week on manual invoice entry. This time drain reduces their ability to react quickly to price changes or margin pressures.
Cons: Time-intensive, error-prone, no real-time insights, scaling limitations, compliance risks
Cloud-based solutions such as Jelly remove these pain points by automating the entire invoice-to-insight workflow and keeping data accurate and current.
Pub and Restaurant Wins: Food Margins, Menus & Supplier Control
Pub and restaurant supplier management needs food-specific tools such as recipe costing, menu engineering, and supplier price tracking. Hotel property management systems focus more on room operations and guest stays, so they rarely cover these kitchen details well. Common challenges include PO and invoice mismatches, vendor management issues, and payment delays that frustrate suppliers.
Successful teams start by spotting price creep patterns through automated alerts. Jelly’s Price Alert feature flags increases immediately and gives operators clear data to challenge suppliers. Cairn Lodge Hotel achieved 5% food cost savings within one month by using these insights during negotiations.
The Howard Arms improved gross profit margins from 60% to 80% after gaining consistent visibility on dish costs and supplier pricing. These results show how targeted data can shift margins without cutting quality or guest experience.
Multi-site operators gain the most from centralised visibility without heavy enterprise complexity. Schedule a chat to see how Jelly’s multi-site dashboard provides real-time control across all locations with a single login.
FAQs: Cloud Supplier Management for UK Hospitality
What is cloud-based supplier management for hospitality?
Cloud-based supplier management automates the procurement workflow from invoice capture through to profitability analysis. These platforms digitise supplier invoices, track price changes, calculate real-time dish costs, and connect with POS and accounting systems. Hospitality businesses replace manual spreadsheets with instant visibility into food costs, supplier performance, and menu profitability across every location.
What tools work best for UK pubs and restaurants versus hotels?
Pubs and restaurants need food-focused features such as recipe costing, menu engineering, and supplier price alerts. Hotels focus more on property management systems that handle rooms, bookings, and guest services. Jelly suits UK pubs and restaurants with automated invoice scanning, real-time dish costing, and Price Alert tools.
Hotel-focused platforms such as Cloudbeds do not provide the granular food cost tracking that restaurant operators rely on for margin protection.
How does Jelly compare to MarketMan for growing venues?
Jelly offers one-week onboarding, while MarketMan often requires a setup period that lasts several months. Jelly charges a flat £129 per month per location with no per-user fees and includes real-time price alerts that MarketMan does not provide. The simplified interface keeps training needs low for chefs, managers, and owners.
MarketMan’s complexity suits larger operations with dedicated procurement teams. Growing UK hospitality businesses usually gain faster value from Jelly, with immediate price visibility and stronger margin protection.
How much time does automation save hospitality businesses?
Automation typically removes 10 to 20 hours of weekly manual invoice processing and data entry. Jelly cuts dish costing from 28 minutes per item in spreadsheets to about 3 minutes through automated ingredient pricing and unit conversions. Invoice digitisation happens almost instantly via email or photo upload.
Real-time reporting then delivers daily margin insights, so operators no longer wait for monthly accountant reports before taking action.
What does pricing look like for small hospitality groups?
Jelly charges a flat £129 per month per location with no per-user fees, which keeps costs predictable for growing businesses. This price includes automated invoice scanning, real-time reporting, POS integrations, and UK-based support. Most competitors add per-user fees that increase costs as teams expand.
Enterprise platforms often require large upfront investments and long contracts, which rarely suit smaller hospitality groups that want flexibility and quick returns.
Conclusion: Jelly for Fast Invoice-to-Profit Automation
Cloud-based supplier management shifts hospitality operations from reactive spreadsheet work to proactive margin protection. Jelly focuses on growing UK restaurants, pubs, and boutique hotels and delivers rapid onboarding, real-time insights, and measurable ROI. Cairn Lodge Hotel’s 5% cost savings and The Howard Arms’ 80% gross profit show the clear impact on the bottom line.
Competitors often prioritise enterprise complexity or basic inventory tracking, while Jelly offers a practical balance of automation and simplicity for growing hospitality businesses. Book a free Jelly demo for cloud-based supplier management and see how automated invoice scanning and price alerts can start protecting your margins next week.