Labour cost percentage calculator
Labour cost percentage is total labour cost divided by net sales, times 100. For a UK independent café the published band is 28-35% of net sales; restaurants, pubs, gyms and salons each have their own.
Enter a week or a month of sales and wages, and the calculator adds holiday accrual, works out the percentage and checks it against the band for your type of business.
Free, no signup. Rules from GOV.UK, Acas and Nory, checked 22 October 2026.
Labour cost calculator
Takings after VAT and refunds, for the week or month you are checking.
Untick if the wages figure already includes holiday pay.
Most trade guides count these as labour too.
For sales per labour hour.
Labour cost
33.62%
On benchmark£3,362.10 of labour on £10,000.00 of net sales.
- Wages
- £3,000.00
- Holiday accrual
- £362.10
Published band for a café or coffee shop: 28-35% of net sales. That leaves £137.90 before the top of it.
Worked example
A café week, £10,000.00 of net sales
A café takes £10,000.00 in a week after VAT. The rota cost £3,000.00 in gross wages across 320 paid hours.
- Holiday accrual: £3,000.00 × 12.07% = £362.10.
- Total labour: £3,000.00 + £362.10 = £3,362.10.
- Labour cost: £3,362.10 ÷ £10,000.00 × 100 = 33.62%.
- Against the café band of 28-35% that reads “on benchmark”, with £137.90 left before the top of it.
- Sales per labour hour: £10,000.00 ÷ 320 = £31.25.
Leave the holiday accrual out and the same week reads 30%, better than it really is. That gap is how a café ends up adding a shift it cannot afford. The café labour cost guide goes through what to do when the figure runs high, and the demo shows the same sum running live on a rota.
UK benchmarks
Published labour cost bands by business type
Labour as a share of net sales, from published UK trade guidance. These are trade figures, not a statistical survey, but they are the numbers an accountant or a lender will quote back.
- Café or coffee shop
- 28-35%
- Counter-service sites run 25-28%; a proper food menu pushes 32-38%.
- Restaurant
- 28-32%
- Pub or bar
- 28-35%
- Wet-led runs 28-35%; a food-led kitchen pushes 32-40%.
- Gym or fitness studio
- 30-45%
- Front desk, instructors and cleaners. A site staffed every open hour with under ~800 members often runs above this; lean 24/7 budget gyms run well below.
- Salon or barber
- 35-50%
- Something else
- No published band
- Clinics, shops and other trades: still worth tracking week to week, against your own past weeks.
Bands drawn from Notions Coffee Consultancy, Gro, Jelly, Brikly, Nory, smartpubtools, bsness, Glofox, The Gym Group plc's H1 2025 results, Two-Brain Business, Gymdesk and barberinsights.com, checked between August and October 2026.
Questions
Frequently asked questions
How do you calculate labour cost percentage?
Divide total labour cost by net sales for the same period and multiply by 100. Total labour is gross wages plus holiday accrual, plus employer National Insurance, pension and agency cover if you count them. £3,362.10 of labour on £10,000.00 of net sales is 33.62%.
What is a good labour cost percentage for a UK café?
Published trade guidance puts a UK independent café at 28-35% of net sales. Where a café sits inside that depends mostly on how much food it makes on site.
Why use net sales rather than total takings?
Net sales is takings after VAT, refunds and discounts: the money the business keeps to pay for staff. Dividing by a figure with VAT in it makes labour look about a sixth lower than it really is.
Why add holiday accrual to wages?
Every hour worked builds up paid holiday, so the real cost of an hour is the wage plus about 12.07%. Leaving it out understates labour by more than three points on a typical café week.
Should employer National Insurance and pension count?
Most trade guides count them as labour, and they are a real cost of employing someone. Add them in the optional field to see the fuller figure. Wavro's own Company costs counts wages, holiday accrual and agency cover.
What is sales per labour hour?
Net sales divided by the paid hours behind them. It says when a shift is overstaffed, which a labour percentage alone cannot: a busy week can hide an extra person on a quiet afternoon.
What if my business type has no band?
The calculator still works out your percentage; it just does not judge it. A band is only shown where a trade source publishes one. An invented range would be worse than none.
Sources
Where the rules come from
This calculator follows the published guidance below. It is a guide, not legal advice: a contract can give more than the statutory minimum, and the contract wins.
Keep going
Related guides and tools
- Café labour cost percentage: what good looks likeHow to work it out, what the UK bands look like and how to fix a high one.
- Cafés and restaurants guidesRota planning, labour cost and clock-in habits for UK cafés and small restaurants.
- Holiday entitlement calculatorHoliday hours earned at 12.07% of hours worked, or 5.6 weeks for fixed hours. With the GOV.UK rounding rule.
- Bank holiday pay calculatorWhat opening on bank holidays costs at your premium rate, for England and Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, this year and next.
- Wavro pricing£9.90/month for up to 10 people, with UK pay rules built in.
- See a sample weekA real rota, clock-ins and labour cost for a small UK team. No signup.
See your labour percentage before the week is worked
Wavro costs the rota as you build it, holiday accrual included, and compares the week against the published band for your trade. Move a shift while it still saves money.
No card, no sales call.