Higher Prices on the Menu
Collecting data points is pretty much a full-time business, and this morning I’m reading an article in NRN (Nation’s Restaurant News) and it has some interest stats ahead of today’s September Retail Sales report and quarterly results from restaurant companies in the next few weeks:
Restaurant menu price inflation continues to increase at a rate well over that of grocery stores but even more when compared with the amount of money Americans are actually earning…
The gap in prices compared with wages helps explain weak consumer sentiment, which declined 13.6% year over year in October, according to the Survey of Consumers at the University of Michigan.
It is also putting more pressure on restaurant chains that are contending with ongoing declines in customer traffic.
Quick-service restaurant sales were up just 0.6% in the third quarter, according to the data firm Revenue Management Solutions. Traffic during the period declined 2.6%.
The full NRN article can be found here.
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