Pay What Its Worth meals

[SaladFingers]

Zebrano @ The Establishment on Greek Street, London offer from the 9th July every Wednesday, diners to pay what they feel their meal is worth, similar to what Radiohead did with their recent album.

Why can't everywhere do this?!!

Has anyone been here, and how much do you think it is worth?

EDIT: And would you pay what you genuinely thought it was worth?

Edited June 25, 2008 by SaladFingers (log)

[CalumC]

Interesting idea. The radiohead principle (as i'm sure it will now become known in some way) worked mainly because they were already losing 90% of their album sales to the record companies, so they still made just as much money (plus the release by XL on top) by doing it themselves. Whether this can work as a parallel to food i don't know. I doubt that people will end up paying more for the food than usual, at least not by much, and a lot more people will pay much less.

Food is also generally more expensive than a cd, so i can imagine a lot of people rounding 2 courses to £10 when it maybe cost more like £20, just because theyve been given the option to do so. I think that people will be less inclined to be honest in pricing the meal.

Personally, i think if i had the money to spend then i would pay what i thought i was worth, but i can see this idea being exploited by people who can't afford to pay those amounts.

[Gary Marshall]

there was a place in london who did this all the time, can't remember the name.

given the most people have no idea of the costs involved in producing food in a restaurant they are likely to underprice it. Doesn't sound like a business winner.

[naebody]

Just Around The Corner, in Golders Green. There's a theory that it makes about 10% per head more than the average, perhaps because its catchment area tends towards uptight and sober types who don't want the shande of underpaying.

Mju, in Knightsbridge, also tried this a few years ago. Unfortunately for them, tourists have more chutzpah when it comes to paying zero.

Edited June 26, 2008 by naebody (log)

[sunbeam]

Interesting idea. The radiohead principle (as i'm sure it will now become known in some way) worked mainly because they were already losing 90% of their album sales to the record companies, so they still made just as much money (plus the release by XL on top) by doing it themselves.

←

It also disproved those people like me who said you couldn't even give a new Radiohead album away. You actually can, although it might be quicker to take them straight down the dump.

Pay what you feel for a meal might work as an amusing gimmick and with nice, gentle, middle-class Londoners, but I would imagine that before long the chancers would make it impossible to sustain. If enough people have the brass neck to pay a penny then walk out, the restaurant would of course die

S

[CalumC]

Interesting idea. The radiohead principle (as i'm sure it will now become known in some way) worked mainly because they were already losing 90% of their album sales to the record companies, so they still made just as much money (plus the release by XL on top) by doing it themselves.

←

It also disproved those people like me who said you couldn't even give a new Radiohead album away. You actually can, although it might be quicker to take them straight down the dump.

S

←

Harsh

Not a fan then?

[Roger le goéland]

A local farmer has just ripped out all his strawberries and replaced them with gooseberries and blackcurrants.

He had a "pay for what you pick" policy, which saw families come with bowls of cream and water, gorge themselves on the field then have the cheek to go to the counter with an empty basket - "we couldn't find any" (whilst still covered in juice). He lost £10,000+ of fruit to the freeloaders this year.

So it will be interesting to see how this goes.

[CalumC]

A local farmer has just ripped out all his strawberries and replaced them with gooseberries and blackcurrants.

He had a "pay for what you pick" policy, which saw families come with bowls of cream and water, gorge themselves on the field then have the cheek to go to the counter with an empty basket - "we couldn't find any" (whilst still covered in juice). He lost £10,000+ of fruit to the freeloaders this year.

So it will be interesting to see how this goes.

←

Infuriating story that one, saw it on the bbc. I'm sure they 'didnt realise' how damaging it would be, but even to take that stance is sheer ignorance, how can the public expect local producers to continue when theyre losing money to these idiots.

[Infrasonic]

A local farmer has just ripped out all his strawberries and replaced them with gooseberries and blackcurrants.

He had a "pay for what you pick" policy, which saw families come with bowls of cream and water, gorge themselves on the field then have the cheek to go to the counter with an empty basket - "we couldn't find any" (whilst still covered in juice). He lost £10,000+ of fruit to the freeloaders this year.

So it will be interesting to see how this goes.

←

Infuriating story that one, saw it on the bbc. I'm sure they 'didnt realise' how damaging it would be, but even to take that stance is sheer ignorance, how can the public expect local producers to continue when theyre losing money to these idiots.

←

Should have just charged a flat fee upfront, bit like the all you can eat buffets, and then put a time limit on how long you could stay in the field. Not condoning what people did, but there are ways round it.

[Carlovski]

there was a place in london who did this all the time, can't remember the name.

given the most people have no idea of the costs involved in producing food in a restaurant they are likely to underprice it. Doesn't sound like a business winner.

←

What it is worth doesn't necessarily bear much resemblance to what the production costs are - A piece of overcooked turbot isn't 'worth' any more than a piece of overcooked mackerel. And I don't paticularly like Caviar - so if a dish came with 'bonus' garnish of caviar (Yes, I know that is unlikely!) the worth to me would go down, even though the costs would have gone up dramatically.

[Roger le goéland]

I am reluctant to say this as I have no evidence to back it up but I read in a magazine that somebody tried that in my native town, and patrons on average paid 3 times what the chef would have normally charged (which allowed to pay for the relatively very few who had the guts to say the food was worth nothing).

[naebody]

Personally, I found the "pick your own" story hilarious.

There's plenty written about how honour systems work, and why they fail. It's not really the public's fault if some moaning farmer (a moaning farmer! Well I never!) chooses not to read it.

Man sets up a business using his own wild assumptions about how a market might work, gets burnt, and loses a few quid. Tough.

As for restaurants: the waitress/customer relationship already creates an awkwardness that shames a majority into accepting things they didn't order, eating the inedible, paying "optional" service charges irrespective of how the service was, not querying that complementary glass of Cava when it shows up on the bill as vintage champagne, and saying "lovely, thanks" on every single check-back.

"Pay as much as you can bear" is just their next logical step in exploiting the acquiescent.