Zoo Café Prices

Tony60

After more than a decade me and my Son (he's 27) decided that we visit our local Zoo yesterday with it being a nice day. We got there early only to find there was about 500 school kids aged about 7-10 years old queuing up so that took time getting in, Anyway after a few hours we went and had our dinner in the Zoo café I couldn't believe the prices £6 for a hotdog £2.50 for a small portion of chips, £2.50 for a cup of tea the list went on and on - ridicules prices for what they were. I told my son it's cheaper to eat the money and next time we'll bring sandwich's. And the Zoo shop was very expensive also i'm amazed they can get away with it.

Sandy_123

Its like it every where 6 pound for a hot dog is pricey

66Mustang

I know this comment probably won't win me any favour because often people don't like to hear logic, they prefer everyone to just join in with ranting about prices, but here goes 😊 😆

£2.50 sounds a lot for a cup of tea but if you break it down it really does make sense

Let's say the waiter/waitress/barista is on £12.50 an hour - the total cost to hire someone (e.g. pension, National Insurance, maternity leave, employee benefits) is about the cost of the salary on top - so the coffee shop is paying £25 an hour to have the employee

Say 3 mins to process your order and make your drink = £1.25

Remember if you sit in then there is VAT @ 20% (so 16.66% of the full price) = ~£0.42

So after just 2 things are paid for there's £0.83 left

Out of that 83 pence there's still lots to pay for…

The cost of the tea bag, water, boiling the kettle, etc

Then you may be paying to sit in their cafe for a while which has to be heated or air conditioned, cleaned, and of course rented/serviced

There's really very little of that £2.50 left over as profit, probably a few pence at most

Rosie_Scope

That does sound a bit expensive @Tony60! Lots of places are having to charge more for their food and drink these days, costs seem to be going up everywhere so prices are rising for customers too. It's a shame, but it sounds like a good idea to bring a packed lunch or a picnic next time you go if you're hoping to save a bit of money. Hope you still had a nice visit.

Interesting to think about it like that @66Mustang, it does make you think about how difficult it can be for places to make a profit off things!