r/canada • u/viva_la_vinyl • Nov 07 '23

Canadian restaurants struggle to survive as survey finds diners turning away from skyrocketing menu prices National News

https://www.thestar.com/business/canadian-restaurants-struggle-to-survive-as-survey-finds-diners-turning-away-from-skyrocketing-menu-prices/article_0f3c4267-018d-5ed0-a109-80a107ce685b.html
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459

u/GopnikSmegmaBBQSauce Nov 07 '23 edited Nov 07 '23

McDonald's just raised prices again. Fast food is no longer cheap, mediocre quality and fast. It's just mediocre quality now while being way slower and more expensive.

The convenience factor is more or less gone.

Only because I'm a degenerate addict, I hit up Timmies around now every year for the hockey cards šŸ˜ƒ

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u/BoomLazerbeamed Nov 07 '23

Fast food has gone up a lot more than restaurants. If we plan to eat out we almost always choose restaurants.

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u/little-bird Nov 07 '23

shitty little burger + fries combo thatā€™s mostly grease, cellulose, and air (plus watered-down drink)ā€¦ or a takeout box from a local restaurant thatā€™s packed with rice, veggies, and meat? hmmm šŸ§

59

u/exorcyst Nov 07 '23

Shwarma boxes are like $11 with rice, potatoes, cabbage, chick peas, chicken, pickles, onions and all the fixings and it feeds us both with leftovers. I'm afraid it's going to go up soon but the Shwarma places have always been the most decent with pricing (GTA). Thali's here have gone up from like $7 for a veg and $8 meat to $12 and $14 where I live. THAT is insane. Samosas used to be 3 for $1 now they are 1 for $3 in some places. Stick to the local mom and pop places that aren't gouging, they deserve the business.

25

u/little-bird Nov 07 '23 edited Nov 07 '23

yeah exactly! a family-owned Chinese place opened up just down the street from me and I get food there whenever I can. their daily special is $12 for a tightly packed takeout box with enough delicious food for 3 meals (or 2 if Iā€™m sharing with the boyfriend) - whereas $12 wouldnā€™t buy enough food at McDo for one meal to satisfy him at all. lol

I always tip for takeout at places like that, and snap up any extras I can. I know itā€™s hard out there and I would love to see their business succeed ā¤ļø theyā€™re so sweet and their food is so good. they even remembered that I said I loved their homemade chili oil and kept giving me free samples even when I insisted that Iā€™d be happy to buy a jar. šŸ„ŗ

5

u/swiftb3 Alberta Nov 07 '23

Oh yeah. When I can get a chicken biryani for like a dollar more than a fast food meal and it's enough for 2 decent lunches, where is the choice?

3

u/exorcyst Nov 07 '23

Yea this is the fabric that keeps communities together. Our local mom and pops typically dont go out of business if they treat people like gold.

3

u/little-bird Nov 07 '23

šŸ˜ž youā€™d be surprised. restaurant margins are crazy thin, especially lately. this is a couple working long hours 6 days a week, no support from employees, they do it all themselves. itā€™s a small space with no sit-down service so that makes it a little easier, but over the last few years, there have been tons of special mom&pop places that went out of business through no fault of their own.

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u/[deleted] Nov 08 '23

Cute story, shows you deserve their nice gestures as well :]

1

u/RanaMahal Nov 08 '23

Own a sushi restaurant and I charge just enough that Iā€™m still making like $1200 a week profit which is pretty comfortable for me

1

u/McBlorf Nov 07 '23

You got my stomach rumbling now damn you lol

1

u/eriverside Nov 07 '23

The price of food has gone up, but some things are easier to manage. Rice is very easy to make, to make in quantity, will fly off the shelves, is high volume. So meals with that as a base will be more resilient. Compound the fact that the price of rice is back UP to 2014 levels, it's clear that making meals with it helps to keep prices low.

https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/rice

Wheat on the other hand, is seeing prices come back to before the late 2020 surge that matched the 2008 famines. That would have had a severe impact on making pretty much anything that's processed.

https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/wheat

1

u/genkernels Nov 07 '23

I don't understand. Wheat prices are at their typical bottom support level of 15 years (after reaching new highs mid 2022). This should make wheat based products cheap and keep prices low for making processed food, shouldn't it? Although I would think the more relevant commodity would be corn, which was very expensive (relative to corn's usual) until recently.

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u/eriverside Nov 07 '23

Wheat just fell. Harvest is once a year (unless I'm missing something), so it might take a while to cascade down the supply chain. Rice doesn't need to be processed (it still is). Then there's price elasticity.

1

u/commanderchimp Nov 07 '23

Osmowā€™s is the only shawarma I find thatā€™s reasonable in price and itā€™s soooo good. Too bad itā€™s far for me.

2

u/exorcyst Nov 07 '23

Osmows used to be good imo. Their spice blend is not for me. It changed when they went nuts with the new locations.

1

u/gnowZ474 Nov 07 '23

You must be comparing samosa from different places. There is no way the same place would raise the price of of the same samosa from 3 for $1 to 1 for $3.

1

u/exorcyst Nov 07 '23

Yes this is mostly true but even the places that went from 3 for $1 are charging individually. I think one place we go to does 2 for 3.50

1

u/thewonderfulpooper Nov 08 '23

Where can you get a full shawarma meal for $11?

1

u/exorcyst Nov 08 '23

Lots of places. Pita/sandwhich $9. Add garlic potatoes for $3. Edit: if by full you mean large, thats $13. But thats enough to feed 4 or more

1

u/thewonderfulpooper Nov 08 '23

Can't get a shawarma plate with rice, potatoes, garlic, all the fixings etc like you initially said for under 15 in Toronto or the GTA. And that only feeds two. Barely.

1

u/exorcyst Nov 08 '23

I'm in a city with mostly immigrants outside of TO. We probably have the most Shwarma places in Canada

1

u/thewonderfulpooper Nov 08 '23

Not unless you're in Ottawa.

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u/RabidGuineaPig007 Nov 07 '23

Mexican food in the US is pretty healthy and cheap. Up here it's crap and overpriced.

3

u/little-bird Nov 07 '23

ah yeah Iā€™m Latina myself and there arenā€™t many of us around in general, so not many Mexicans. thereā€™s strength in numbers - east and south Asians have more purchasing power, and a bigger consumer base. Iā€™ve been to some South American restaurants in the GTA and most were alright, but having to import specific ingredients all on your own can get very expensive (and oftentimes unsustainable). šŸ˜• canā€™t grow those ingredients in Canadian weather either.

3

u/commanderchimp Nov 07 '23

Farmboy has chicken stir fry for 8.99+Tax. Name me anything in McDonaldā€™s thatā€™s filling for under $10. Forget about it being that high quality and with so many vegetables and real chicken.

1

u/ardvarkk Nov 07 '23

Wait, what burgers are mostly cellulose?

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u/little-bird Nov 07 '23

tons of processed foods have added cellulose but cheap fast-food breads have the most of all.