What it does
VendorWatch scans paper or PDF invoices with the iPhone camera and pulls out line items, prices, and quantities. It compares each line against the prior invoice from the same vendor and flags price increases, missing items, duplicate charges, and case-pack changes (where the case dropped from 12 units to 10 but the case price stayed the same — that's a 20% per-unit increase hidden in the spec change).
The fastest way an independent restaurant loses money is paying invoices without verifying line items. Vendors raise prices mid-week and rarely flag it. Some hide it in spec changes. Some round up. Some bill twice. The first invoice an operator scans usually catches an error.
Every scanned invoice builds the price history. Over time, the operator has a complete record of what every key ingredient cost from every vendor across every week. That history is what lets you negotiate, switch vendors, or just verify your accountant's COGS number against what you actually paid.
Key features
- AI-powered invoice scanningPoint the iPhone camera at a paper or PDF invoice. Line items, prices, quantities, vendor info — pulled into structured data.
- Automatic price comparison vs. prior invoiceEvery scan checks the new line items against the same vendor's prior invoice. Price increases highlighted. Missing items flagged. Duplicate charges caught.
- Case-pack change detectionVendors sometimes shrink the case (12 → 10 units) without changing the case price — a 20% per-unit increase hidden in the spec. The app catches it.
- Multi-vendor price historyBuild a longitudinal record of what every ingredient cost from every vendor. Useful for renegotiation and for understanding which vendors are drifting.
- Crumpled-invoice tolerantReal restaurant invoices arrive folded, faded, food-stained. The OCR is tuned for thermal-paper invoices and partial folds, not just clean PDFs.
- Free to startFirst 25 invoice scans per month free, indefinitely. No credit card required.
How operators use it
Related articles
- How do I automate food cost management?
- Weekly restaurant inventory audit
- How do I lower labor costs?
Related glossary terms
FAQ
Built by an operator
VendorWatch is published by ALSTIG INC, founded by Ben Mouton — a 14-year independent restaurant operator. Every app on the ALSTIG stack came from a problem hit during the run, and every feature was tested at Mouton's Bistro & Bar in Cedar Park, TX before release. Free to start. No platform contracts. Read the operator-direct articles or browse the operations glossary.