After featuring Paste magazine's pay-what-you-want subscriptions last month, one of our Springspotters alerted us to a restaurant in Vienna where diners decide how much they'd like to pay. Located on the Liechtensteinstraße, Der Wiener Deewan serves five different Pakistani curries daily, three of which are vegetarian. Prices for drinks are fixed, but customers decide how much they'd like to pay for the food. Most pony up a fair price, and the restaurant doesn't seem to suffer from its unusual pricing plan.
A bit of research shows that Der Wiener Deewan isn't the only restaurant to take a laissez-faire approach to prices: Melbourne's Lentil As Anything also lets customers pay what they can afford or what they think the meal was worth. The business now runs three locations in Melbourne and provides space for artists and writers. The One World Café in Salt Lake City and the SAME Café (So All Might Eat) in Denver operate on a similar basis, and also let customers specify portion sizes (which isn't a bad idea for any restaurant).
While a few customers might take advantage of a restaurant's altruistic motives, most are happy to shell out a little extra to cover free meals for those who can't afford to pay. Could be just the thing for restaurateurs looking for a way to combine social entrepreneurship with a love of cooking.
Websites: www.falter.at/web/wwei/detail.php?nr=5266
www.lentilasanything.com — www.soallmayeat.org — www.oneworldeverybodyeats.com
Spotted by: Martina Meng
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don´t you guys have an austrian flag?
Hi Philipp -- Yes, we definitely do have an Austrian flag! Fixed now, and thanks for pointing that out :-)
Hong Kong also has a pay-as-you-wish restaurant called 萬佛閣 (literally 10-Thousand Buddha House). Opened in 2006 by the boyfriend of a local celebrity, it sells Buddhaism vegetarian food. I was wondering why they're so brave to open this restaurant, but they have a tactic: no walk-in customers, everyone has to make reservation. It's also located in Happy Valley which is a place beloved by bourgeois.
The restaurant doesn't seem to have a website, there's some photos in these blogs.
http://blog.pixnet.net/gbisw/post/7878393
http://comtools.esdlife.com/blog/index.php?op=ViewArticle&articleId=79895&blogId=2273
The blogger said he paid HK$100 per each head at the dinner, and my mom tried it last week too and she paid about HK$150 per head. Not sure if that's too little or too much, the waiters didn't know it because we put money into a red Chinese pocket and put it into a box.
there's a place just like this in Seattle called Terra Bite. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2003558690_terrabite06e.html
Actually YiXiang, the restaurant (called Annalakshmi) is still in operation and going strong not just in Singapore, but also in Kuala Lumpur.
The restaurant is a regular port of call for my family whenever we are in either of these cities. The food is homecooked by resident South Indian aunties and it is delicious!!
There's one of these restaurants in Perth, Western Australia too.. on prime real estste; right on the river-front - i don't know what it's call though :(. it's been open for quite some time - i guess it depends on where the restaurant is, but it seems some people actually aren't completely selfish and greedy and ruled by the "rules of economics". I think this kind of thing gives me hope for human-kind.
This could work but the restaurant would have to make significant money by selling advertising space. Or they would have to offer membership plans and then pay what you wish on top of that.
Membership can sell for 3 times a week $20
10 times a month $30
And then they could also do this if they offer a free membership to people who work as help.
And then they would also have to get their food at a bargain somehow and I can't imagine it being that great if they did this.
Perhaps they could entice people to pay more by saying that part of the proceeds went to charity.
Then this could work and they could make a profit.
If there were more of these pwyc/pwyw restaurants, the idea would catch on. This is one situation in which the market truly decides the best price.
Great idea!!
Call me a cynic tho' but this really wouldn't work in Britain.
I apologise for my country...
Pandi is wrong. I stopped at a roadside snack place near Guilford last year. Had a lovely breakfast sandwich and a cup of tea. No fixed price; just pay what you think it was worth/what you can afford. I happily paid a fiver (which is over the odds) and I suspect that a lot of others do too.
There is a restaurant in Edinburgh with a pay what you like night on a Tuesday. The owner was telling me that he makes a bigger profit that night than any other night.
The Telegraph reckoned it was working: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/global/main.jhtml?xml=/global/2005/06/12/nrest12.xml
"It sounds like a recipe for financial ruin: a restaurant that allows customers to pay what they think their meal is worth. Yet the business tactic is proving a success and "pay-what-you-like" restaurants are spreading across Britain."
There is one of these in Tel Aviv also. Best Indian food I have EVER had. It's called Sub Ketch. If you ask the drummers on drum beach they can all give you directions.
How completely wonderful!! I would eat here all the time. I would also pay extra for those who couldn't afford a meal and those who would and could ruin this wonderful concept. Thank you. Such a small contribution and a big plan to improving our world! kudos to you!
This could work but the restaurant would have to make significant money by selling advertising space.anyway this is nice article thanx for sharing it
It's not so much that this 'could' work, but rather that it actually does. For whatever reason, the 2 restaurants in Melbourne (Australia, not Florida) are rather succesful.
I don't think that us humble melbournites are any less or more greedy than those around the world, I imagine that similar concept could work elsewhere, without membership, advertising or any extra revenue scheme beyond that generated by good food itself.
Reminds me of the Radiohead album:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/10/01/bcnradio101.xml
here in Auroville india there is an eatery called indus valley ... http://www.auroville.org/thecity/bharat_nivas/bharat_nivas_indus_valley.htm
Also, Seva Cafe in Ahmedabad and Karma Kitchen in Berkeley.
Here in Brazil, unfortunately doesn't exist anything like this!
more of most unusual restaurants here:
http://restoran.us/trivia/unusual.htm
I wish the WHOLE WORLD worked like this!!! Wouldn't that be a different kind of place?!
Cheers!
I would be interested to look at demographics for each successful restaurant's location.. I may be entirely wrong, but it seems like that kind of restaurant in the portion of town I live in, which is predominantly poor university students and homeless people, there would be an imbalance of people who could afford to pay extra.
How many people who could actually use the free/reduced meals actually live near these concept restaurants in order to take advantage of it?
This is a lovely idea. I would be happy to pay a little extra if I knew it would go to people who could use the help getting a good meal.
I am a Senior at the College of Charleston and for our Senior Capstone project we were to come up with a business plan. My group stumbled upon this website early on and agreed that this is the business we would like to open in Charleston, South Carolina. We have faced a lot of questions but over all with our defensive strategy, we have noticed, has turned others around into believing in our concept. I believe if you have the investment to pursue this business and you can afford the risk ... then all should pursue this venture ... I support this 100% and wish there really was one near me! Who knows maybe I'll just go forward with it since I have already written the business plan.
Much has been said about how this fantastic world-view towards ending hunger would or would not succeed as a business, which I believe it would. I plan to open just such a place where I live. I too am seeking any persons or groups who are interested in financial start-up capital, investors. I too have been in the food biz for @18 years and I believe this is a winner. If you want to join me in a way to help make a difference then please send word to findclint@mac.com. Thanks.
Not entirely sold on the idea. (unless the voluntary pricing is based on some religion eg buddhism or some other social cause).
A more sustainable model is through a bidding process. Highest bidder wins available table. Non winning bidders can wait for next available table.
hi,
yixiang from singapore here.
we once had this concept in singapore. it was by an indian resturant, but closed down like half a year into business.
y?because everyone only cares about themselves...rule of economics...
i'm really eager to see how long this concept can last...
yixiang | November 13, 2007 5:04 PM