June 29, 2012

Sandwich prices are going to change Monday

We’re raising our sandwich prices from $5 to $6 on Monday. (On the trucks the price has technically been $4.67 before tax, and will now be something like $5.60 before tax.)

This is a scary sort of thing for us all. I think we’re afraid some of you might have been coming just because of our price. Or that others of you will come less often because we’re more expensive than we used to be. Or maybe worse yet, that people will not try us because the price is $6 not $5.

The last time we played with prices seriously was fall 2008. At that time McDonald’s Double Quarter Pounder was $2.39, the Big Mac was $2.25. I dreamed to lowering our prices someday, getting closer to McDonald’s and others. My thought was that I wanted our food to be accessible to anybody who wanted to eat with us.

Fast forward 4 years and now 1/3 of McDonald’s sandwiches are MORE EXPENSIVE than ours. That’s crazy. We’ve seen a lot of our prices sky rocket, and we want to support future pay increases for our hardworking employees. All of this means there’s been pressure on our prices. But we’ve been scared to change them.

Well it’s time to take the plunge. We hope you all understand and still love us anyway. Enzo is thinking of setting up a “Price Shock Therapy” boot at the MIT truck. Sort of a joke, but maybe only sort of. I’m about to head out for the weekend. I’ll be around Monday at various locations so you’ll have to chance to tell me what you think of the price change to my face : ) Thanks all.

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