Food and beverage director job description

In a large hotel, the director may oversee an executive chef, several restaurant and bar managers, and a banquet team. Each has their own operation to run, but the director is responsible for how they work together.

In a luxury hotel, the lobby bar, the signature restaurant, room service and banquets "might all run simultaneously under the same director," says the Culinary Institute of America. That is several businesses at once, each with its own team and costs. Below: what the job owns, who reports to it, how it is measured, and a job description to copy.

What does a food and beverage director do?

The director runs the hotel's food and beverage (F&B) department. Each restaurant and bar in it is called an outlet. Many hotels call the job "director of food and beverage".

Who reports to the food and beverage director?

At many hotels, the F&B director reports directly to the general manager (GM). Larger properties may have a director of operations between them, who also runs the guest rooms. The executive chef, restaurant managers, banquet leadership and bar managers commonly sit within the director's department, although the exact reporting lines vary by hotel. Where the hotel has a beverage director, that person runs the drinks program, and the bar managers report to them.

In larger hotels, the catering sales team sells the events and the director runs them. So the director and catering sales agree on menus, prices and minimum spend before the contract goes out.

The handover matters. Before a contract is confirmed, the sales and F&B teams need to agree on what the kitchen and banquet staff can deliver, how the event will be staffed and whether the price covers the cost.

Food and beverage director vs F&B manager

The two titles overlap. In a hotel with both, the manager runs the outlets day to day and reports to the director. In a smaller hotel, one person does both, under either title.

F&B manager job description

This is the F&B manager posting, for the level below the director; the director's job description is further down. It follows the manager's column in the table. Fill in the brackets.

Food and beverage manager, [hotel name], [city]

• Run the services in [named outlets], and work the floor on the busiest ones.
• Schedule and train the floor teams to the labor budget.
• Keep each outlet on its food, beverage and labor cost targets, and report them to the director every [week].
• Check deliveries against orders and invoices, and run the outlets' stock counts.
• Handle and record guest complaints and incidents.
• Keep each outlet inside its liquor license and its food safety and allergen rules.

How is the department measured?

Hotels commonly use the Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry, or USALI, to organize their financial reports.

It puts revenue and expenses into consistent categories, so owners can see how the food and beverage department is performing and compare it with similar hotels.

USALI gives F&B its own schedule (a fixed set of lines). The important distinction is departmental profit. That shows what food and beverage earns after its own operating costs, before expenses shared across the hotel.

Costs the whole hotel shares (administration, sales and marketing, maintenance, energy) stay outside the departments. USALI says it is "not appropriate to allocate" them. That makes it easier to compare departmental performance without differences in how hotels allocate overhead.

But departmental profit isn't the same as the profit the hotel owner keeps. The hotel still has shared operating costs, property expenses and other obligations to pay.

The four ratios

The four ratios are beverage cost %, departmental profit margin, F&B revenue per available room and F&B revenue per hour worked. Their formulas are below.

Take an example hotel with 200 rooms. At 200 rooms over 30 nights, the hotel has 6,000 available room-nights. Its bar takes $120,000 in beverage revenue, and its cost of beverage sales is $24,000. Beverage cost is $24,000 ÷ $120,000 × 100 = 20%. That is an example, not a target.

The bar's $120,000 of beverage sales works out to $20 per available room-night. That's a beverage-only calculation. To measure the whole F&B department, you'd include the restaurants, banquets and other F&B revenue too.

Now suppose the hotel sold 4,800 of those room-nights, an occupancy rate of 80%. The same $120,000 works out to $25 per occupied room-night.

Beverage cost % = cost of beverage sales ÷ total beverage revenue × 100

Departmental profit margin % = F&B departmental profit ÷ total F&B revenue × 100

F&B revenue per available room = total F&B revenue ÷ available room-nights in the period

F&B revenue per hour worked = F&B revenue ÷ total hours worked in the department

Each number answers a different question. Beverage cost tells you what proportion of drink sales went into ingredients. Departmental margin shows what's left after running F&B. Revenue per room helps compare hotels of different sizes, while revenue per hour worked helps the director assess staffing against sales.

Revenue per hour worked is new in the 12th edition of USALI, which applies from January 1, 2026. USALI's committee says it gives more consistent comparisons than ratios based on customers or covers.

For one bar, beverage cost % is the same idea as pour cost. The difference: beverage cost % covers the whole period, and you work it out from stock counts and invoices. So it includes juice, syrups, garnish, spoilage, waste and spillage.

Benchmarks

CBRE studied 866 US full-service, resort and convention hotels during the first half of 2025. Their F&B departments averaged a 29.1% departmental profit margin.

Of those departments' operating expenses, 59.4% went to labor and 24.0% to food and beverage costs.

These are useful comparisons, but a convention hotel serving hundreds of banquets works differently from a smaller hotel with one restaurant and a lobby bar. Compare your results with properties that have a similar operation. CBRE also notes that departmental profit doesn't capture every property cost attributable to F&B, so don't treat 29.1% as a universal target.

Food and beverage director job description template

Fill in the brackets, and delete anything the hotel doesn't have.

Director of food and beverage, [hotel name], [city]

About the role

Lead food and beverage at a [number]-room [full-service / resort / convention] hotel with [number] restaurants and bars, [number] square feet ([number] m²) of event space and in-room dining. You report to the [general manager / director of operations], and lead the executive chef, the outlet managers and the director of banquets.

Responsibilities

• Set the concept, menus and drinks lists of every outlet, with the executive chef and outlet managers.
• Run the banquets and events that sales books; agree on menus, prices and minimum spends with catering sales.
• Build the annual budget, and deliver the revenue, cost and departmental profit targets.
• Review monthly results against budget, explain significant differences and agree on corrective action with the outlet managers.
• Hire, train and develop the managers; plan labor against forecast occupancy and events.
• Set food and beverage cost targets with the managers, review supplier terms with purchasing, and investigate stock usage, waste and unaccounted stock.
• Keep every outlet inside its liquor license and its food safety and allergen rules.
• Walk the outlets and major events every week, and act on guest feedback.

Requirements

• [Five] or more years in hotel or restaurant F&B management, including [two] years leading managers or overseeing a department.
• Has built and run a departmental budget; working knowledge of USALI.
• [CFBE (Certified Food and Beverage Executive) or a degree in hospitality management] preferred.
• Available evenings, weekends and for major events.

Pay and benefits

[Salary range], [bonus on departmental profit and guest scores], [benefits].

Qualifications and pay

One certificate for this job is the CFBE, from the American Hotel & Lodging Educational Institute. To take it, you need one year as a department head in food and beverage or culinary management. Its exam covers food operations, beverage operations, marketing and sales, financial management, leadership and human resources. On education, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics says employers may prefer education after secondary school, especially at upscale restaurants and hotels.

Salary

The Bureau of Labor Statistics doesn't publish a separate salary figure for food and beverage directors.

For comparison, food service managers working in hotels and motels earned a median of $82,240 in May 2025; the middle half earned $72,070 to $103,340, and the top tenth $131,060 or more. That group includes a wider range of management jobs, so it shouldn't be treated as the typical salary of a hotel F&B director.

For hiring, compare similar roles at hotels of comparable size and complexity, then consider the department's budget, number of outlets and event business.

In bars, food service managers earned a median of $67,320. For bar manager pay in the US, UK and Australia, see bar manager salary.

Questions

Sources

1. Hospitality Financial and Technology Professionals (HFTP), Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry (USALI), 12th Revised Edition. Published July 2024; mandatory adoption date January 1, 2026. Maintained by the Global Finance Committee, sponsored by HFTP and the American Hotel & Lodging Association.
2. HFTP, HFTP, AHLA and GFC Unveil Groundbreaking 12th Revised Edition of the Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry (USALI). Press release, July 11, 2024.
3. HFTP, with support from the American Hotel & Lodging Association, Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry, 11th Revised Edition (2014; HFTP digital reprint). Food and Beverage, Schedule 2 (book pp. 24 to 25); department payroll titles (pp. 146 to 149); food and beverage metrics (pp. 203 to 207).
4. Robert Mandelbaum, The USALI 12th Revised Edition: An Expert Overview of the Updates.
5. USALI Global Finance Committee, USALI 12th Revised Edition: changes in the new edition (committee presentation, 2024).
6. Robert Mandelbaum and Andrea Grigg, Hotel Food and Beverage: A Bright Spot in 2025. November 13, 2025; first half of 2025, 866 US full-service, resort and convention hotels.
7. Morgan Westcott and Wendy Anderson (eds.), Introduction to Tourism and Hospitality in BC, 2nd edition, section 3.3: Operations.
8. The Culinary Institute of America, What Do Food & Beverage Directors Do?.
9. Tanya Venegas, USALI 11 Article Collection. On management agreements requiring the current edition.
10. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Outlook Handbook: Food Service Managers.
11. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025: national industry-specific estimates, NAICS 721100.
12. American Hotel & Lodging Educational Institute, CFBE: Certified Food and Beverage Executive.