Benchmarking is a continuous, systematic, management process for measuring work processes, products, and services for the purpose of organizational comparison and improvement. Benchmarking has been used in business and industry since the early 1980's, but has just recently become more common in foodservice operations. Benchmarking is a useful management tool for foodservice directors to use in leading their operations to achieve performance improvement. Benchmarking is more than comparative data analysis or industrial tourism. An expert opinion mail survey was utilized to rate important activities and factors in foodservice benchmarking. The eleven expert panelists had knowledge and/or experience in correctional, health care, school, college/university, business and industry, and commercial foodservice operations. Results of the expert opinion survey identified important benchmarking project topic selection criteria to include: impacts on costs, quality, and productivity; and contributes to the success of the organization. Important benchmarking partner selection criteria were: able to meet planned timelines, interest in benchmarking topic, reputation for excellence, and willingness to share information and data. Methods of data collection most likely to be used by panelists were: archival research, internal records, mail survey, personal meetings/site visits, and telephone interviews. Panelists determined important data collection and analysis activities to be: check for inaccurate or missing data, determine ''best practice'' organization, and identify performance gap and reason for gap. Important action phase activities were: develop and implement action plan, communicate results, establish functional goals, and monitor results. A benchmarking guide developed for use by foodservice managers will be shared.