Breakfast Inflation

[Son of Butch]

Coffee Shop seems the right place to post this topic.

A restaurant with reputation of serving the best breakfast in the state has reopened for indoor dining. Their $8.75 breakfast special before the pandemic is now 11.75 an increase of 34.3%

 

[Stocker Steve]

Are they running at reduced capacity?

 

[sstterry]

The cost of grits has gone up

 

[greybeard]

Coffee Shop seems the right place to post this topic.

A restaurant with reputation of serving the best breakfast in the state has reopened for indoor dining. Their $8.75 breakfast special before the pandemic is now 11.75 an increase of 34.3%

Bullet proof vests for the servers are expensive?

 

[FungusProudKY31]

Probably trying to recoup extra plumbing costs when they had to add a 3rd bathroom for the undecided.

 

[EasTex]

Just wait until that $15/hr minimum wage kicks in.....

 

[Son of Butch]

Just wait until that $15/hr minimum wage kicks in.....

Hmm, maybe making $15 hour will stimulate more to eat out and increase restaurant volume leading to a return of the old menu prices, but I highly doubt it.
Local businesses that were advertising $12 hour starting wages 2 years ago are now advertising $14 hour to start, so marketplace supply and demand has almost reached $15 already.

Steve is probably the closest in reasoning.... business volume.
It was a very popular, very busy restaurant that seemed to be consistently running
at 75-90% capacity and a good number of times on weekends having to wait for a table putting them at 100% capacity. Now I'm guessing their total business volume is probably down by a 1/3 or more. Maybe it will bounce back in 6 months.

 

[callmefence]

Hmm, maybe making $15 hour will stimulate more to eat out and increase restaurant volume leading to a return of the old menu prices, but I highly doubt it.
Local businesses that were advertising $12 hour starting wages 2 years ago are now advertising $14 hour to start, so marketplace supply and demand has almost reached $15 already.

Steve is probably the closest in reasoning.... business volume.
It was a very popular, very busy restaurant that seemed to be consistently running
at 75-90% capacity and a good number of times on weekends having to wait for a table putting them at 100% capacity. Now I'm guessing their total business volume is probably down by a 1/3 or more. Maybe it will bounce back in 6 months.

Doesn't work that way more volume should mean higher prices. If a business is running at high to full capacity you raise your prices. There's no way else to grow.
Low capacity you lower price to draw more.

 

[Stocker Steve]

I think we are backing into the universal income things with this "progressive" shotgun approach - - tax credits, stimulus checks, child checks, increased unemployment benefits, multiple food programs, subsided apartments, fuel assistance...

Meanwhile we can not find people to cook, cut lumber or build housing.

 

[Son of Butch]

Doesn't work that way more volume should mean higher prices. If a business is running at high to full capacity you raise your prices. There's no way else to grow.
Low capacity you lower price to draw more.

Good points fence, but...
Running at 85% capacity in good times does not = full capacity.
They were able to maintain high volume because they offered excellent value.

I agree with you, reopening and customers returning in significantly reduced numbers combined with a 34% price increase may kill their chances of returning to their previous popularity.

 

[Son of Butch]

Just saw on local TV news, fireworks prices are expected to be up 35%
this 4th of July. Biden and the Fed say temporary inflation, no worries, but I think they are going to get caught with their pants down and end up looking like unprepared fools a year from now.

 

[callmefence]

Just saw on local TV news, fireworks prices are expected to be up 35%
this 4th of July. Biden and the Fed say temporary inflation, no worries, but I think they are going to get caught with their pants down and end up looking like unprepared fools a year from now.

It'll take two things to lower prices.
Availability of goods and labor.
If you're selling something and it's in short supply, you don't know if can get more your a fool not to make all you can on what you got.
If people can't get anyone else to show up to do work, the ones that will can charge more.
Go try to make a deal on just about anything right now. The customer doesn't have the hammer anymore, they're just distracted with free money and don't know it.

 

[Allenw]

The covid shut down has the on demand goods flow that had been established previously messed up. Plus being able to make more money setting on your tail then working is making it difficult to keep things running smoothly. Any thing made in the democrat stronghold states that were shutdown is going to be in short supply.

 

[Lucky]

They could’ve went up on prices because supply prices and overhead have gone up significantly. Might have even been needing to go up for a good while before the shutdown but knew people would throw a fit. We see it around here all the time. A restaurant raises prices so everyone gets mad and quits going and they shut down or a restaurant needs to raise prices but won’t because they are afraid to loose business and they go out of business. Just because you have a line out the door doesn’t mean you are making money.

 

[OBAX]

Just wait until that $15/hr minimum wage kicks in.....

There may be some truth to this, but I think it’s more about American front line workers making a living wage. I know for me, I get my blinders on and I expect that when I go to the Dollar General, or the Quick Trip, etc., I want to be checked out in a timely fashion. I expect those workers to do their job and “serve my needs” quickly. I often do not think about the fact that a two income household could be forced, by today’s wages, to live on $600/week ($300 each). A raise in minimum wage would be life changing for those households. They could come closer to living on $600/week each ($31,200 per year).
I do not and will not claim to be well off or above middle class, but I know I would not be able to live like I want to or like I do on $31,200/year. Nor should I expect that others would. If that causes my cost of goods go up a little, then do be it. I’m for ALL people to have a chance at a better quality of life.
Just my $.02.

 

[Lucky]

There may be some truth to this, but I think it’s more about American front line workers making a living wage. I know for me, I get my blinders on and I expect that when I go to the Dollar General, or the Quick Trip, etc., I want to be checked out in a timely fashion. I expect those workers to do their job and “serve my needs” quickly. I often do not think about the fact that a two income household could be forced, by today’s wages, to live on $600/week ($300 each). A raise in minimum wage would be life changing for those households. They could come closer to living on $600/week each ($31,200 per year).
I do not and will not claim to be well off or above middle class, but I know I would not be able to live like I want to or like I do on $31,200/year. Nor should I expect that others would. If that causes my cost of goods go up a little, then do be it. I’m for ALL people to have a chance at a better quality of life.
Just my $.02.

I’m with you on expecting too much at these places, lots of folks look down on them and it’s not right. The workers you speak of are generally some of the nicest people you’ll see all day.

By reading this post I’d guess that the poster makes above minimum wage. If so how did you get above minimum wage and why did you try to get an above minimum wage pay rate? I have people apply for a job and complain about making minimum wage when they don’t even know how to wash their own clothes or god forbid get up on time. If someone will explain to me why I should pay a person that thinks it’s ok to play on their phone, be late, take off when they want, can’t add or subtract, come to work presentable, or even remember what to do without a detailed job list $15 an hour I’m all ears. The basic argument is if they make more they’ll work harder, we all know that’s not true (at least in the long term). Maybe companies need to have an honest discussion about how a $15 minimum wage will affect consumer prices. I know they’ve done the studies. Throw the numbers out and let the public decide. I pay based on merit and believe that’s how it should be. It does bother me that there are Billion dollar corporations that pay nothing and treat their employees bad but it’s the publics job to fix that not the Government’s.

My nephew wants a good job but thinks he should start at $20 minimum. The boy lives at home and knows allot about nothing so of course he can’t land a job like he wants. He is always fishing, hog hunting, partying, and riding atvs instead of trying to better himself. The last job I helped him get paid $15 and he called in sick 4 times in 3 weeks. The last day he called in sick I found out he was at my house needing air and gas for his 4 wheeler. I told his boss to just fire him. I know this is an unpopular opinion but I say he’s just too lazy to work. Yet public opinion is that he should be paid the $15 and be allowed to have fun and live a good life at his employers expense. It’s like saying the people that aren’t smart enough or don’t go to college for whatever reason should pay for the ones that do. Maybe I’m getting old but I think the United States had gone crazy.

 

[Dsth]

I agree with Lucky 100%

 

[greybeard]

I see more and more mid aged (or older) people working at fast food or other 'minimum wage' jobs nowadays, whereas decades ago, it used to be mostly people just out of high school or high schoolers working part time jobs. I have often wondered how/why those older people just never developed any job skills. I can understand the women, who may have spent a decade or 2 as the stay-at-home parent raising families while hubby worked and therefore have no commercial workplace experience, but it's seemingly also about a 50/50 split men to women that I see around here in those lower paying jobs, and all races.

 

[OBAX]

I also agree with a lot of those points. I do believe that there is a problem today with younger generations feeling like they should have a laborless job and start out at an elevated wage. It will be a big problem in years to come when all the plumbers and construction workers die off and there’s nobody to replace them. I’m all for a kid going to college and getting an education but I think the expectation after college is the problem. We as parents are making them believe they can hire on as a CEO and make $100k plus.
It’s not those kids I refer to in my previous post. There are parents and grandparents that are raising these kids that are expected to raise these kids on 20k per year and it does not work. I think that the employers will have to be diligent about weeding out the workers that want to draw a check without working, but ALL those who will work deserve to earn a living wage. I think that $15/hr gets closer to that. The disclaimer is, I could not live on that still. I have cattle! You say that it’s our place to fix it, not the government. But I’d argue that the purpose of the government is to assist that process with a wide brush. We seem to want to cherry pick what we want the government gets involved in and not get involved in. That seems to be be what’s causing the problem. I’ll say that I’m in favor of the minimum wage hike in hopes it will help those that desperately need it, and we take more individual responsibility to keep out workers in check.
I hate to make everybody suffer because of a few bad, lazy apples.

 

[Brute 23]

Every one is having to may more for people to come to work than the govt is paying them not to work. That is driving prices up.

Bad thing is... the sheep think they making more.