How do I calculate how many seats I need to cover rent?

Add rent, CAM, property taxes and insurance. Divide by the healthy occupancy share for your type of business to get the monthly sales needed. Divide that by days open and your average check to get guests a day, then by turns per seat and 75% to get seats.

What is a table turn?

One seating of guests at a seat or table. A busy café or lunch spot may turn its seats several times a day; a dinner-only restaurant may turn them once or twice. Use what you expect on a typical day, not your best one.

Why does the calculator assume seats are 75% full?

Few places fill every seat on every turn. Planning at 75% leaves room for slow days, and it is the same planning case DoorWorthy reports use for the rent a business can afford.

What if I cannot fit that many seats?

Test a higher average check, more turns from longer hours, or a lower rent. If takeout or catering will carry part of your sales, use the rent-to-sales calculator with your total monthly sales instead.

Free calculator

How many seats do I need to cover rent?

Enter the rent, your average check and how often each seat turns, and see how many seats, guests a day and daily sales that rent asks for.

How many seats you need57 to 95seats

To cover $6,200 a month in rent and charges at a healthy 6% to 10% share for a restaurant or bar, with seats 75% full across 2 turns per seat a day.

Daily sales needed: $2,385 to $3,974
Guests a day: 86 to 142
Monthly sales needed: $62,000 to $103,333

How many seats at each share

1424%outside

956%healthy

718%healthy

5710%healthy

4812%outside

Blue columns are the healthy 6% to 10% band for a restaurant or bar. A higher share needs fewer seats but leaves less for everything else.

How the math works

Seats needed = guests a day needed ÷ (turns per seat × 75%)

Sales needed: Rent plus CAM, property taxes and insurance, divided by the healthy occupancy share for your business type. The high end of the band needs fewer seats; the low end leaves more for payroll and food costs.
Healthy occupancy share by business type
Business type Healthy share of sales
Café or bakery 8% to 10%
Restaurant or bar 6% to 10%
Salon or personal services 10% to 15%
Retail store 8% to 12%
Fitness or wellness 10% to 15%
Another concept 8% to 12%
Guests a day: Monthly sales needed ÷ days open ÷ average check.
Seats 75% full: Few places fill every seat on every turn, so the seat count assumes seats are filled 75% of the time. It is the rent-to-sales calculation run backward, so the two calculators agree.
Not included: Takeout, delivery and catering do not need seats. If they are a big part of your sales, raise the average check to reflect them, or use the rent-to-sales calculator with total sales.

Healthy occupancy share by business type
Business type	Healthy share of sales
Café or bakery	8% to 10%
Restaurant or bar	6% to 10%
Salon or personal services	10% to 15%
Retail store	8% to 12%
Fitness or wellness	10% to 15%
Another concept	8% to 12%

DoorWorthy reports run this same calculation for a real address, next to the spending, competition and rules found there.

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How many seats do I need to cover rent?

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How many seats at each share

How the math works

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