Is it confusing to you when you go to a restaurant and you can buy a hamburger for $12, a side of fries for $4, or a hamburger-with-a-side-of-fries for $14?
No but it's confusing when they ask you if you want a booth or a table. The booth is an extra $2 unless you're at the bar in which case it'll only be $1 because they want more people to sit in that area.
Do you want a hamburger, a cheese burger, a burger with bacon or both? Most restaurants just have different kinds of burgers on the menu but we like to give you options... 'cause we care so dang much. (
)
Do you want cheddar instead of american cheese? The cheese is $1 extra, the bacon is $2 extra, the cheddar is an upcharge on the american +$.50.
Do you want a side of fries? If so, cheese fries or cajun or cajun cheese? (fries are $4, cheese added $1, cajun $1, cajun cheese $2.50*.
Now, we used to have a waistline special where for an extra $3, we'd give you 20% less food to help with your dieting but due to
recent management changes, that's been scrapped and we just put a $3 service charge on every meal so despite what people are saying, we're working hard to make things easier for everyone!
Okay, on to your drink. You said you wanted tea. Would you like strawberry ($$), mango ($$), hard ($$$) or hard with flavor ($$$$)?
Oh you just want regular($)? You know, most people don't get regular but if that's all you want I guess we can do that.
Sweetened or unsweetened? Don't worry, they're the same price... unless you want the organic conflict-free crystal sugar or the the artificial sweeter that
isn't known in the state of California to cause cancer
(yet, anyway) in which case it's $1 or you can do a sugar/cancer-free substitute combo for $1.50.
Let me tell you about the desert menu, now. This one's simple; we only have one item: vanilla ice cream,
starting at $8. Now on that ice cream would you like....
BTW, the kitchen is a little busy tonight and we anticipate it may take over an hour to get your meal out. We have an option where your order can go ahead of most and we can probably have your food out in 30 minutes. That's only ($$) and I suggest you take it because see that family of 10 over there waiting to be seated? They've got at least another 15 minutes before they even get a table and start looking at a menu but if they opt for this and you don't, you'll be waiting for your food longer since we'll be making theirs first.
Oh - almost forgot(!) - all of these prices are subject to change daily with premiums on weekends, holiday weeks/seasons, the month of April, and the king of Norway's birthday - he's just so cool! how could we
not honor him?
... When the check comes out at the end of the meal, it'll be nice and simple and fully itemized, just like a cell phone bill.
Don't ask - just put the card in the machine on the table (It'll be a $2.50 handling fee if you want your server to run the card for you).
Most importantly, don't worry about the money. You're on vacation after all.
... This isn't about the burger or the fries. It's about the burger and the fries and everything else around them that everyone looking to ignore what the restaurant is doing doesn't want you to focus on when you say the change they just made to the cost of choosing paper towels over a blower in the restroom is making things more complicated.
In the case of our restaurant, how do you even figure out before you head out if you can afford to cover your meal?
The answer of, course, is if you don't have more than enough credit available on that card of yours and you even need to question the price, we don't want you here.
It's because we think we're running Capital Grill and we're not... Also, Capital Grill's menu is a heck of a lot more straight-forward because most
real fine dining doesn't have to
trick their customers into spending more.
*yeah, why is it more to get cajun AND cheese than both seperately? Because studies of menu pricing have shown if you make it complicated, it's possible to slip little things like this in with guests often not noticing or bothering to question when they do. Also, some of the most expensive up-charges on the menu (just like at Disney) are really only there to make the lesser up-charges seem more reasonable even though we'll still push to get you to go for the top ones anyway in hopes you'll settle on the "middle" option when all is said and done. - citation with real world retail examples of this kind of work in action if you think I'm just making this up as a thing Disney and others do in an effort to manipulate their customers into spending more than they intend to.
We had many days were we did AK then hopped to Epcot. Now I either will have to buy the more expensive 4 park Genie + or pay for Epcot and then AK.
