<!—->
Restaurateurs have been affected by a sharp increase in the prices of raw materials, especially flour, milk, eggs and meat. In addition, they have to cope with the effects of the energy crisis. How does the situation affect prices in catering establishments?
“Costs for restaurateurs are rising faster than they themselves are raising prices. Nevertheless, restaurants have recently been raising prices across the board, by about twenty percent in larger cities and by ten to fifteen percent in villages,” says the director of the Association of Restaurateurs, Luboš Kastner.
The price of steak or fried cheese, for example, has risen significantly. However, according to Kastner, the price of lunch in larger cities should not exceed two hundred crowns.
“For responsible restaurateurs, the price will remain at two hundred crowns. But it would be too much in the villages. There you can buy the main meal for one hundred and fifty to one hundred and seventy crowns, but maybe including a drink or soup. People have fixed prices in gastronomy and don’t like to accept a change for the worse.” This is how pub owners figure out how to keep their regular customers and not go bankrupt at the same time.
“A burger that was two hundred grams can suddenly become one hundred and eighty grams. But you can’t always reduce everything. Gastronomy became professional due to the crisis. “Many entrepreneurs understood that they had to adjust their vision – manage the business differently, change the menu, bring new dishes, and partly increase the price, and explain it to the customer,” Kastner described. According to him, restaurateurs are paradoxically most troubled by beer.
“Why suddenly pay three crowns more for beer? That’s what customers ask. We try to make it as expensive as possible, but we need much more. It is an essential product for the Czechia, but it contributes less and less to covering costs. It’s such a gift and an economic problem for restaurateurs,” he described.
Thus, Kastner does not expect that the price of beer in restaurants would rise significantly during the summer. “The restaurateurs don’t have the courage to do it yet, but the situation will soon force them to do so. 70 crowns for a draft beer can become a reality in the centers of big cities as early as autumn. In smaller cities, one tap for a price between fifty and sixty crowns. I don’t wish for it, but it is the way it is,” he added.
Despite the higher prices, however, according to Kastner, the Czechs will never become a “box nation” and people will continue to go to restaurants, just perhaps less often.
<!—->
–
