Ingredient Prices Series at Toast: 30+ Data Reports That Proved Out a Benchmarking Product

At a glance

30+ original data reports, launched in 2023
20%+ of target keywords ranking in the top 3
20+ industry backlinks earned every month
Built on proprietary invoice data from xtraCHEF’s restaurant customer base

The idea

Restaurant operators had no reliable way to see what other kitchens were paying for ingredients. xtraCHEF had that data sitting in thousands of customer invoices. I saw a chance to turn it into content that ranks, earns links, and eventually becomes a product.

I pitched the series as the minimum viable product for a larger interactive ingredient price benchmarking tool. The reports would prove demand, build search authority, and test which ingredients and metrics operators cared about most.

My role

I owned the program end to end:

Came up with the concept and won buy-in from xtraCHEF leadership, product owners, marketing leadership, and executives
Worked with the data analytics team to turn raw invoice data into usable insights
Wrote and updated every report
Chose the graphics tool and designed every visual
Partnered with commodities experts at the Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute to add market commentary to each report

Results

The series became a durable organic engine. More than 20% of target keywords reached the top 3, and the reports earned 20+ industry backlinks every month, driving sustained organic growth across restaurant technology categories.

The product it was meant to become

The end goal was an interactive benchmarking tool. Operators could compare a limited set of their own ingredient costs to market data, with deeper benchmarks gated behind a conversion to generate pipeline. The concept reached the final stage of selection but was not chosen, mainly because of the expected web development lift. Toast has since folded similar capabilities into its restaurant analytics suite.