Restaurant Management Degree - Online and Campus Programs

Have you dreamed about managing your own restaurant? Perhaps you make mental notes when dining out, knowing how you'd improve the restaurant if you had the chance. Now is your chance. Restaurant management degree programs offer the right combination of entrepreneurship, business courses, and restaurant beverage and catering management classes to arm you with the skills to open, manage, and grow a successful dining establishment.

How to Prepare for a Restaurant Management Career

Get experience working in as many aspects of the restaurant business as you can, from serving to menu planning to bartending. But if you want to advance to owning and managing your own restaurant, or running a catering business, you can benefit greatly from formal training. A two-year culinary arts degree can help you climb up the ladder, but a four-year or graduate degree in restaurant management combines the vital skills in hiring and managing a staff, ordering food, overseeing the menu, complying with health codes, and business law.

Restaurant Management Education Requirements

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reports that restaurant and catering recruiters prefer managerial candidates with direct assistant manager experience combined with restaurant entrepreneurship and/or restaurant management degrees. Some 42 percent of all restaurant managers are self-employed proprietors.

Restaurant Management Salary Range and Job Outlook

The median 2008 annual salary for restaurant and catering managers was $46,320. Top earners took home $76,940. The BLS predicts that job prospects for restaurant service managers will grow by 5 percent between 2008 and 2018.