The economics of all-you-can-eat buffets

The Hustle ^ | 25 Jan 2020 | ZACHARY CROCKETT

[DUMBGRUNT]

Like most restaurants, buffets operate on extremely thin margins: For every $20 in revenue, $19 might go toward overhead, leaving $1 (5%) in net profit.

Larry’s got a reputation around town for being a gourmand. He’s got an appetite that puts Homer Simpson to shame — and on this particular day, he’s ready to do some serious damage.

Larry pays his $20 and proceeds to eat 5 servings of steak and chicken, far more than the average customer.

The cost of this food to the buffet amounts to $16.90. This means that after factoring in other expenses, Larry has handed the restaurant a loss of -$8.50.

While the restaurant loses $8.50 on Larry, it makes $3.70 from the under-eater and still takes in its steady $1 margin on the average eater.

. Over the years, buffets have made headlines for kicking out guests who eat too much:

A 6’6″, 350-pound Wisconsin man was removed from a buffet after downing 12 fried fish fillets (and subsequently arrested for protesting outside). A German triathlete was asked to prematurely leave an $18.95 buffet after consuming 100 plates of sushi. A woman was booted from a Golden Corral for eating all the brownies, then attempting to smuggle home extras in her purse.

[OttawaFreeper]

I went to Vegas back in ‘99 and did the buffet at Bally’s for dinner one night and that was not bad at all. I was told that they have the champagne fountain there for the Sunday morning brunch.

[olesigh]

give me a seafood buffet with all-you-can-eat lobster

[workerbee]

Anyone who’s worked in restaurants will tell you -— it ain’t just the buffets that are gross. If you only knew what goes on in the kitchens of even the most “high end” restaurants!

[clearcarbon]

I never go to a $18.95 all-you-can-eat buffet if I can get all that I want for $5.95 somewhere else.

[EvilCapitalist]

Though not a buffet, the Cracker Barrel in Williamsburg has good food. At least it did when I was there in 2017.

[rockrr]

Word has it he stuffed his coat pockets with shrimp on the way out the door.

So that's where that smell was coming from!

[Fast Moving Angel]

I do miss the Carnival World buffet at the Rio in Vegas.

The Rio's seafood buffet was awesome ... do they still have it?

[EvilCapitalist]

Have you seen the Simpsons episode where Homer goes to the All You Can Eat seafood restaurant?

[Chickensoup]

you and me both.

[OttawaFreeper]

GMTA, I actually went there also the night I was in Williamsburg. I later learned that an Olive Garden is also there too.

[dp0622]

Yeah bro don’t go near a buffet armed lol!!

Did something HORRIBLE happen to you at one once? :)

I love em!!

A million mussels and shrimp for 12 bucks!!

Never got sick once.

And you’d be surprised how not NEARLY everyone is fat.

Maybe not even 5 percent. At least not where I go to.

In fact, I’m not sure why one would go unless you’re gonna destroy mussels and shrimp, like i do.

all in all, you pretty much summed them up correctly though :)

[Viking2002]

Oh, agreed, and it's very peculiar in which restaurant it is. I think it must be something like a visual que or, more likely, olfactory. It hits me the worst in Olive Garden. I'm a garlic-a-holic. I'll tunnel through a hill of breadsticks and a cool, crisp salad, and by the time the entree arrives, I'm ready to ask for a to-go container. I mean there is a psychology behind it that restaurants use as a food service roadmap. I'm gorged and engorged, but somehow my wife always finds one little empty space left for tiramisu. LOL

[olesigh]

no I have seen all of buffets though

[P.O.E.]

If you order off the menu, you are stuck with what they bring you. A buffet lets you try a little of everything, then take more of what appeals to you.

[Responsibility2nd]

I’m on my phone. Otherwise I would post the picture.

“ You been here Four Hour. You go now!”

[Maceman]

Did someone say "all-you-can-eat-buffet"?

Here is the guy who, IMHO, is the funniest comedian ever (or at least one of them), doing his bit about all-you-can-eat buffets.

Here is the bit by the late, great comic John Pinette:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8i4eQm8VgI&t=343s">All-You-Can-Eat Buffets

[proud American in Canada]

When I lived in Texas, when I was about 21 oh, I worked for a carpet cleaning service and we were called to clean a Chinese restaurant. It was a Sunday and it was closed. I went into the kitchen and could not believe what I saw ... Vats of used oil with crumbled pieces still on for them; apparently there were going to be reused. Gigantic cockroaches all over the floor and steel counters and cockroaches get huge in Texas. I don’t mean to be a party pooper, but sometimes I think it’s better to stay home and make stuff from scratch in an area you know is clean.

[jdsteel]

“ It’s also the tenth time I’ve lost exactly $0.00. That’s because I played $0.00”

My wife and I went to Vegas last year and we both gambled the same as you. That said, we had a great time and would go back again. Great shows, restaurants, sights and people watching.

[OttawaFreeper]

The Ponderosa was a novelty for me as a kid back in the 1970s and ‘80s (since most of them went out of business in Canada by about 1985-86) with the bottomless soft drinks and all you can eat salad and dessert bars.

[Calvin Locke]

Winner, winner, breakfast burrito?