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Just like bars and nightclubs, the security issues that restaurants face come primarily from inside the business, and with the potential for up to 25% of profits to hemorrhage out on a monthly basis due to employee carelessness or theft, an increasing number of restaurant owners are turning to camera systems for help. Though outside threats such as robbery or break-ins are also a constant reality, not only do internal leaks cause a large loss in revenue and inventory, they do so on a daily basis and, if allowed to go unchecked, can do irreparable damage to the revenue stream of any restaurant.

Despite this, the catch-22 with adding cameras is that, if overages have already taken a bite out of profits, the cost may be difficult to bear, and especially for nicer restaurants that need to preserve the ambiance and décor of their dining areas, adding cameras to the interior of the building might just seem unfeasible. It’s a delicate balance to strike, but with just a little planning a surveillance system in a restaurant can be an effective, unobtrusive investment that keeps money in the business without making customers wonder why Big Brother is watching them.

The starting point of restaurant coverage should always be the points of sale. This is because one of the most common forms of employee theft happens here; a waiter doesn’t feel his tips for the night were good enough so he takes a few extra dollars from the till. Simply stationing a dome camera with a varifocal lens (such as the KG-602VF) above each register would be ideal as they could be focused to provide a tight field of view, allowing them to watch bills as they enter and leave the register. To preserve décor, though, using a pinhole camera such as the KG-700P1 would also be a means to the same end. Managers who have noticed serious deficits in their cash drawers would also benefit from a point of sale capture box, which adds a text overlay of the details of the transaction (amount due, payment method, change due, and soforth) onto the footage from the camera to provide a rock-solid visual record of every transaction during the course of an evening.

After the registers have been covered, the next two priorities should be the kitchen and any storage areas. This too is to guard against employee dishonesty; cameras in the kitchen will ensure that cooks don’t sit down on the job, while cameras monitoring storage ensure inventory doesn’t go home with employees at the end of the night. Here, since customers don’t see these areas, using dome cameras (the 602DSP, for example) would be a great remedy to issues in these areas; everything that happens is recorded, and since the cameras aren’t hidden employees are left with constant incentive to stay honest. The only trick here would be freezers; though they may not be very camera-friendly, simply covering the entrance and exit points works just as well to record who went in and what they came out with.

Aside from these three, one area that’s commonly overlooked is the actual dining area. As the public part of the restaurant, it might not seem that this is an area that needs coverage, however even well meaning employees can occasionally take a chunk out of the bottom line. For instance, consider a waiter who gets distracted by some friends who happened to come in, causing him to forget a table and bring a customer’s entrée out fifteen minutes after it was finished. Though this kind of an issue isn’t as malicious as register theft, it can end up costing just as much money if that customer is dissatisfied enough not to return. By covering the dining room, management can not only watch out for this, but also use the footage obtained to critique existing employees and to help train new ones. Even given this, because customers constantly see these areas, tastefully blending cameras into the décor is crucial.

Though dome or bullet cameras would work fine from a technical standpoint, even the low-profile KG-600DSP or KG-190SWB may prove to be too large to be acceptable. In this case, the use of covert or pinhole cameras would provide the same crisp picture that a standard camera would, but in a much easier to conceal package. Cameras such as the KG-700P1 could be easily hidden in a variety of places given their tiny size (one square inch), while at the same time disguised cameras such as the PIR or Smoke Detector Cam would allow cameras to be hidden in plain sight, making the layout much easier while keeping customers from ever knowing they’re there. When pursuing this option, though, it’s always wise to consult an attorney about the legality of hidden cameras in your city and state before you buy any equipment; you wouldn’t want to purchase something you couldn’t actually use!

Even considering the delicate layout of the cameras, the heart of a restaurant surveillance system will be the DVR, where all recording will take place in a digital format. The reason for this is that the DVR controls the framerate (the number of pictures recorded per second), and, especially where cost is concerned, getting the right framerate for your individual restaurant is crucial. For instance, a system that only monitors the serving floor may not require as high a framerate as a system that monitors points of sale, where fast cash counting can take place. Additionally, the size of the system may also determine the DVR for you. A small, family-run restaurant that never experiences register theft and only wants to monitor for general liability purposes would do well with the standalone 1304NET DVR and four cameras, while for a larger restaurant with multiple rooms and several registers a larger, PC-based system such as the PC Witness Pro V\RT would accommodate more cameras while also doing so at higher resolution and higher framerate. In either case, though, it’s important to get what’s needed for your specific restaurant, not necessarily what’s the most expensive (or, on the other hand, the cheapest). Think of shopping for a system like interviewing new staff: it’s not just how much they’ll work for, it’s how much they’ll bring in and how well they’ll do the job.

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