A practical outline for a short business plan, with a realistic staffing and labor cost section.
Lenders, partners and you yourself need a plan that shows the business can work. Short and specific beats long and vague.
Labor is often the largest cost in service businesses, so the staffing section matters as much as the sales forecast.
15 items. Use it on screen, or print it and fill it in by hand.
A couple planning a juice bar builds the staffing section from 70 opening hours a week with two people on duty: 140 shift-hours. At $17 plus burden, labor is about 31% of forecast sales, which they reduce by cutting slow evening hours in the plan.
Lenders, including those making SBA-backed loans, generally want to see how a business will make enough to repay, and a plan with labor built from real shifts is far more credible than a guess. Writing the plan also forces the owner to test whether the hours and prices actually add up.
| Business | Fold and Press Laundromat, Richmond VA |
|---|---|
| Concept | Self-serve and wash-and-fold, 7 am to 10 pm |
| Startup costs | $185,000 incl. 30 machines |
| Staffing | 1 attendant on duty, 105 hours a week |
| Wage rate | $15/hr plus 12% burden |
| Labor cost | About $1,764 a week |
| Break-even | Month 9 at forecast sales |
A laundromat is equipment-heavy, so startup cost is large while staffing is just one attendant at a time. The labor figure is 105 hours at $16.80 including burden, which comes to $1,764 a week.
Under ten pages for most small businesses.
Often yes.
From opening hours, people on duty and wages.
Yes, compare plan and actuals.
Add up monthly fixed costs like rent, insurance, base wages and loan payments, then divide by your contribution margin, which is the share of each sales dollar left after variable costs like ingredients or materials. The result is the monthly sales you need to cover costs. Show it in the plan next to your sales forecast so readers can see how far above or below it you expect to be.
It varies widely by industry. Restaurants and cafes often plan labor somewhere around a quarter to a third of sales, while retail and service businesses differ. Build your number from actual shifts and wage rates, then compare it to the forecast, rather than starting from a target percentage.
More for the same job
Once the small business plan template is in place, the next question is usually about shifts and hours. Book a demo to see how EZTime handles scheduling and time tracking.