Rustica Sourdough Bakery Cafe – South Yarra VIC

Rustica Sourdough has been baking in Melbourne for 15 years. We run our own production bakery in Footscray and supply cafés, restaurants and retailers across the city. Our Chapel Street store is the flagship: a high-volume venue with its own in office pastry kitchen and a café team of around 25 across front of house and kitchen, open 7am–4pm weekdays and 8am–4pm weekends.

We want an experienced operator who runs a venue like a business. You will run front of house and own the venue’s results: labour, margin, sales and standards, working alongside our Executive Chef and pastry team. You will have the authority to run it your way within our systems, and you will report to our Operations Manager and the owner.

What you’ll own
Labour: roster to trade and hit wage targets
Margin: ordering, waste control and stocktakes, working with our Executive Chef to hit COGS targets, tracked live in Restoke, our cost management system
Sales growth: lift average spend, grow takeaway bread and pastry sales, and convert catering enquiries
Team: hire, set transparent standards, hold people to them, and develop your people.



Front-of-house hiring decisions are yours
Standards: deliver the Rustica product and service on every shift using our SOPs and systems
Suppliers: manage day-to-day supplier relationships, quality and issues
Reporting: weekly numbers to the Operations Manager and owner, with a clear plan for the

What you’ll bring
4+ years managing high-volume cafés, restaurants or hospitality venues
A record of hitting wage, COGS and sales targets, and the numbers to show it
Experience leading large front-of-house teams in high-volume venues
Confidence with rostering, POS reporting and stock control systems
Robust specialty coffee knowledge
Availability for weekend trade within the roster below

What you’ll get
A performance bonus for beating the wage and COGS targets
You write your own roster, with one weekend day off every week and no night trade (we close at 4pm)
Real authority over the store, including front-of-house hiring, with direct access to the owner
Meals on shift and staff discounts on bread, pastries and coffee

📌 Cafe Venue Manager Melbourne
🏢 Rustica Sourdough Bakery Cafe
📍 Melbourne