Are restaurants over priced?
- Thread starter MrDawn
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In my opinion no in general when it comes to the food. A lot of the markup comes from drinks or sides but they have to make the profit somewhere. I don't mind prices at the restaurant - I feel like I'm paying for the service, convenience, and experience.
Can be
Food is not overpriced in most cases in my opinion, you are paying for the place, the kitchen power, etc., the ingredients, skill and time of the chef, etc.
Drinks on the other hand, especially wine are usually massively overpriced, they often add a huge markup of 100's of percent, and I don't see that cost can be justified.
Drinks on the other hand, especially wine are usually massively overpriced, they often add a huge markup of 100's of percent, and I don't see that cost can be justified.
Do you think they are?
I think places like Coltons, Ruby Tuesday, and AppleBee's are.
$2.50 for a glass of pop that's mostly filled with ice cubes is definitely overpriced.
$7.00 for a piece of cake for dessert is definitely overpriced.
I think for some foods at a restaurant that they take a hit and others they purposely overprice it to try to even it out so they still make a profit and can pay their workers.
$7.00 for a piece of cake for dessert is definitely overpriced.
I think for some foods at a restaurant that they take a hit and others they purposely overprice it to try to even it out so they still make a profit and can pay their workers.
Yeah, pretty much this.
A few years ago, one of my friends argued that restaurants were grossly overpriced, and he could make the same quality of food for much cheaper by cooking it at home. Which he could, but:
1) We didn't get any of the 'restaurant' atmosphere that I liked;
2) We had to decide what to eat in advance (the danger being that, on the day, I might feel like something completely different);
3) We were restricted to just having dishes that he knew how to cook;
4) Worst of all, it meant all four of us had to have the same dish. No more picking your favourite thing to eat: it had to be something that we could all agree on. And that was tricky, since we all liked different things (for example: they liked meaty things that I didn't particularly like, while I liked spicy things that they didn't particularly like). So we just ended up with something boring, that we would all eat, but that nobody was excited about eating.
The lesson from that experiment was clear. We wanted high quality, high convenience, and a low price - but we couldn't have all three at once. We had to pick two.
You made excellent points and I never thought of it that way. Thank you for the post!
Its always been expensive to eat out compared to cooking at home. But as far as eating out goes, how much it costs is going to vary.
It's just like car maintenance, it would be cheaper to do it yourself but sometimes it's faster and more convenient to take it to the shop.
You know what is overpriced... food at amusement parks like Six Flags!
You know what is overpriced... food at amusement parks like Six Flags!
Agreed and it's because they know you will buy it. Most if not all theme parks mandate that you can't bring outside food and beverages into the park. They can mark up the prices so high because they know most people would buy it anyway because it's convenient, as opposed to leaving the park to eat and then come back having to wait in long lines in the heat.
Exactly, the same thing goes for stadiums and concert venues as well.
I once went to a baseball game and got hungry so I finally decided to just pay the $15 for a hot dog but when I went to purchase they were all sold out! Had to settle for a bag of chips.
2 Fun Facts about major league stadiums (with prices):
1. An estimated 14.6 million beers (about 1.2 million gallons) are sold at major league stadiums every year. That’s enough to fill 1.7 Olympic-size swimming pools.
2. An estimated 22 million hot dogs are sold yearly at major league ballparks. Lined up from end-to-end, that’s 3,100 miles, or about the distance from Boston to San Francisco.
Some are, some aren't. I did go to a supper club that was very expensive but worth every cent.
I think restaurants in the US are overpriced for how little they pay servers in most places.
Yep, it's a very good business!
