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Berlin: Record harvest sparks mass giveaway of free potatoes

theguardian.com

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Re: Berlin: Record harvest sparks mass giveaway of free potatoes

#71

Post by chao- »

KellyCriterion wrote: post #34
novaRom wrote: post #24

Fun facts from Germany: - Fresh Aldi potatoes are like 0.5 Euro per 1 Kilogram - basically the same price as 25 years ago when Euro currency was introduced - Our national TV channel now shows a great collection of "potato recipes" videos on demand on its main page - Price of McDonalds/BurgerKing fries is around 4 Euro, and 5-6 Euro as a street food - Crisps like Pringles are like 15 Euro per 1 Kilogram (a typical 2.5…

Small fries at McD had been lately around 2,99 EUR, that was very expensive given that the "small fries" are actually really small :-D

In the US, a rule of thumb for restaurant economics is that only about 25-35% of an item's price is the cost of ingredients, when you average over all menu items (of course some items better margins than others). The rest goes into labor, fixed costs, etc. It varies a bit by region and by market segment (e.g. fast food vs fast casual vs fine dining), but not by too much.

Re: Berlin: Record harvest sparks mass giveaway of free potatoes

#72

Post by pests »

throwup238 wrote: post #65
KellyCriterion wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Small fries at McD had been lately around 2,99 EUR, that was very expensive given that the "small fries" are actually really small :-D

They’ve been driving people to use their app for years now. The menu prices isn’t what one pays if they use the app, since it has a constant stream of coupons and discounts that bring the list price down.

Pretty much a standard 20% off, sometimes 25% as a deal depending on amount spent. BOGO value menu McDouble / McChickens. Points that add up to actually free food. Items not on the menu in store. It's robbery if you don't use their app now.

Re: Berlin: Record harvest sparks mass giveaway of free potatoes

#73

Post by esperent »

chao- wrote: post #71
KellyCriterion wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Small fries at McD had been lately around 2,99 EUR, that was very expensive given that the "small fries" are actually really small :-D

In the US, a rule of thumb for restaurant economics is that only about 25-35% of an item's price is the cost of ingredients, when you average over all menu items (of course some items better margins than others). The rest goes into labor, fixed costs, etc. It varies a bit by region and by market segment (e.g. fast food vs fast casual vs fine dining), but not by too much.

For McDonald's fries it's certainly much less than 25%. These are a high margin item, I wouldn't be surprised if ingredients costs is only 5% of that €2.99

Re: Berlin: Record harvest sparks mass giveaway of free potatoes

#76

Post by chao- »

esperent wrote: post #73
chao- wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US, a rule of thumb for restaurant economics is that only about 25-35% of an item's price is the cost of ingredients, when you average over all menu items (of course some items better margins than others). The rest goes into labor, fixed costs, etc. It varies a bit by region and by market segment (e.g. fast food vs fast casual vs fine dining), but not by too much.

For McDonald's fries it's certainly much less than 25%. These are a high margin item, I wouldn't be surprised if ingredients costs is only 5% of that €2.99

Of course! That is why I qualified it as "averaged over all menu items". The expectation is that higher-margin items are purchased in a volume that balances out lower-margin items.

Also sodas/fountain drinks are famously high-margin. Depending on the size, as much as a third of the COGS comes from the disposable cup.

Re: Berlin: Record harvest sparks mass giveaway of free potatoes

#77

Post by speed_spread »

docdeek wrote: post #6
solatic wrote: post #3

> “There were pictures of huge mountains of ‘earth apples’,” she recalled, using the word Erdäpfel, an affectionate term for the potato sometimes used by Berliners Fun fact: the Hebrew translation of potato, תפוח אדמה, is the portmanteau of "earth" (אדמה) and "apple" (תפוח). If you should ever be so fortunate as to have too many potatoes, see if you can shred them with a food processor and combine with onion, egg, sa…

The French term for potatoes is also ‘earth apple’: pomme de terre

Diverging but funny: "pommes de route" is a french-canadian colloquialism for horse droppings (on the street - "road apples")

Re: Berlin: Record harvest sparks mass giveaway of free potatoes

#80

Post by burnt-resistor »

Animats wrote: post #54
pixl97 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cattle, ethanol, vodka. Not sure what else with these numbers.

The US corn industry is lobbying for more ethanol in gasoline. Nobody else can absorb all those carbs near term.

5% of all land in America is used to grow corn because taxpayer money in the form of government subsidies makes it a cash crop. Socialism wealth transfer just for farming.
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