Pay-What-You-Want Has Patrons Perplexed

[WestVirginiaRebel]

NY Times:

CLAYTON, Mo. — The country’s latest experiment in pay-what-you-want eating started last weekend when a cafe run by Panera Bread, one of the fastest-growing chain restaurants in the country, began refusing payments from customers in this affluent St. Louis suburb and politely asked them instead to “take what you need, leave your fair share” in wood-and-plexiglass lockboxes.

There was a line out the door at the peak of the lunch rush — a crew of government workers, area professionals and the merely curious who seemed enthusiastic, if a little bewildered, about the enterprise. Was this a high-class soup kitchen? A newfangled charity?

Neither, it turned out. It is one of about a dozen operations around the country providing free or low-cost food to those who need it and trying to sustain themselves off the money their paying customers decide to toss in the box.

Some will call it a hot trend, others a pipe dream, but the notion of letting diners choose what they pay for their meals has been gaining traction over the last decade as an outgrowth of the organic food movement and the advent of social entrepreneurs — those who believe that making a profit and doing good are not mutually exclusive.

The intention is that these restaurants will take in enough cash to cover their expenses. If money is left over, restaurants embracing the concept say they plan to use it to help needy people by feeding them or giving them jobs.

Such restaurants are not charities in the traditional sense, though many rely on support from nonprofit groups. Panera, for example, will offer financial and other support, like donated food, to its new concept store here.

Ron Shaich, the chairman of Panera and a co-founder of the chain, says that if “we see people are gaming the system, we’re going to say, ‘Why don’t you come in and volunteer?’ ”

“It’s a test of human nature,” Mr. Shaich added. “The real question is whether the community can sustain it.”

At the restaurant Wednesday, some customers paid nothing and signed up to volunteer later, though everyone was hazy about what they would be doing.

Lynn Richardson, 30, who works for a music promoter, paid roughly 50 cents more than the $5.48 “suggested funding level” for her potato soup and diet soda.

David Eisenbraun and Melanie Holland, two college students taking a break from yard work to buy lunch with her mother, dropped $15 into the box for their meals — though the suggested price was $24.95. They also wondered just how “charitable” the entire enterprise really was.

“I don’t have the foggiest idea of where the money’s going,” said Mr. Eisenbraun, who also wondered about the company’s motivation: “Are they in it for the good press?”

Such skepticism, coupled with a fair amount of freeloading, has all but killed the concept in other places. The phone at the Java Street Cafe in Kettering, Ohio, which last year embraced the pay-what-you-want strategy, has been disconnected, and it appears to have closed.

And Tierra Sana in Queens folded — though it offered customers a pay-what-you-want option only one day a week.

The Terra Bite Lounge, a cafe in Kirkland, Wash., operated as a pay-what-you-want restaurant for a year or so. But Ervin Peretz, its owner and a lead technical designer at Google, said the cafe now charges for its meals. He said he dropped the model in part because of issues particular to its location — it is in a neighborhood popular with teenagers.

Founded in 2003, One World Everybody Eats in Salt Lake City is one of the oldest pay-what-you-want restaurants, and like Mr. Peretz, its operators have found the concept a bit challenging. It is now owned by a nonprofit group and suggests customers pay a small amount, say, $4 for a meat or fish entree.

“I used to let people put their money in a basket and make their own change, but then I went to a lockbox,” said Denise Cerreta, the cafe’s founder. “You learn how to cut down on the people who will take advantage of the concept.”
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Hippies, meet economic reality...

[pollyannaish]

[Pepper]

Pollyannaish! WestVirginiaRebel!

 

This has been done by other losers, liberals before.

 

As you know, it has been a hugh success. This is now the standard business model for most restaurants and stores in the United States today.