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chairmanbrando t1_je88ste wrote

Reply to comment by tusant in Mill on MacArthur shoutout on r/mildlyinfuriating by hornhead71

I already rarely ate out before this plague hit. Now I do so even less.

As usual, it's the corporations at the top fucking everybody below. For instance, the big eggmongers are bragging about their 700% increased profits while everyday people are like, "Are you fucking serious with the cost of a dozen eggs?!"

Our unchecked capitalism is gonna raw-dog this country until there's no one left who's able to buy anything.

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Opacy t1_je9e1bo wrote

> Our unchecked capitalism is gonna raw-dog this country until there’s no one left who’s able to buy anything.

I sometimes wonder if our corporate masters realize how much Americans value eating out. Our social safety and services may be gutted, none of us can afford to buy a house, and we’ll all be bankrupted by a single bad medical bill, but damnit, we can all ignore that if we can go stuff our faces on cheap reheated SYSCO crap at the local restaurant of choice.

If people start getting priced out of being able to eat out, people might start getting legitimately angry at the state of things.

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chairmanbrando t1_jead4ok wrote

It would be rather humorous if the revolution started not because of housing or healthcare but because of taters...

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BureauOfBureaucrats t1_je9l0wr wrote

> Our unchecked capitalism is gonna raw-dog this country until there’s no one left who’s able to buy anything.

I haven’t been to a proper sit-down restaurant in over 2 years because we’ve been fucking broke. I’m tired of even existing at this point.

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ttd_76 t1_jea2tuh wrote

It's The Mill. Look at that menu. $9.50 for fries with cheese, bacon, and gravy. Not that that isn't tasty, but it's horrible for you.

This is a fairly expensive restaurant in a relatively affluent area. People are not going there because they need sustenance quickly between working their two jobs. They are going there to splurge on food over a two hour brunch.

Their prices are on the higher end because they are trying to appeal to the higher end consumer. When the economy goes bad, luxury goods and services are the first to go. The next few years are going to be a bloodbath for local coffeeshops, breweries and restaurants.

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OrtizDupri t1_jea7y8p wrote

$9.50 is not “higher end” prices

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ttd_76 t1_jeahfub wrote

You're having a bit of an avocado toast moment. A bag of frozen fries at the store is what-- like $1.25 a lb?

If a school cafeteria were serving $9.50 fries with cheese, bacon, and gravy we would all be throwing a fit that they are serving unaffordable and unhealthy food.

You are paying extra money for your fries to be extra fucking tasty and unhealthy, and not have to do the work of cooking bacon and gravy and cleaning all of that up, so you can sit down and enjoy life and friends for an hour or so.

That is not corporations driving up the prices of inputs. That's demand from people who have both the money and time to savor a nice, long, relaxing, extra tasty meal and maybe some Mimosas. The Mill is filling that demand.

It's not like The Mill is ripping people off. If you want a fine French Fry experience while hopefully also paying their staff living wage, it's gonna cost an amount of money that only the relatively wealthy can afford.

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OrtizDupri t1_jeahubs wrote

?

I mean I'm not a loaded fries person, but $9.50 is about what I would expect to pay at literally any bar or diner in most of the country for loaded fries. Bowlero, a bowling alley, charges like $15 for the same thing.

It's not high end.

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ttd_76 t1_jeavqk1 wrote

Yeah, but Bowlero is kind of the same thing. At Bowlero you are also paying for the bowling, and the disco lights, and the arcade, and whatever else they got going on. It's not the food, it's the experience.

I miss old school bowling alleys where you just went there mainly to bowl. We used to bowl league at the old AMF by the airport and it was like $3.00 a game and half the time they'd let you bowl cheaper and sometimes for free.

But there wasn't a demand for cheap bowling anymore. That's why AMF had to rebrand themselves as Bowlero and bring out the loud music, blacklights, bars, DJ's and 40 lane entertainment complexes. I remember they had that "Bowling is just the beginning" ad line, which is really just another way of saying "No one wants to just bowl anymore."

The Mills is not particularly "high end" as far as Richmond brunch-ish places go. But Richmond brunch-y places are inherently somewhat high end. Everything is, nowadays. Bars, restaurants, movies, even strip clubs are trying to upscale in their own weird way.

There are no working middle class-ish entertainment options because the working middle class has been steadily drying up in this country in a way that is unsustainable.

You can definitely see that in Richmond. We used to laugh about how the Richmond scene was just Greek/Italian and burgers. There used to be like 20 places in the Fan that would serve you a ridiculously oversized plate of baked spaghetti for $10. Most of them have closed. But now there are 20 breweries in Scott's Addition where you can buy $20 four packs.

Things are gonna go back to being cheaper, shittier, and probably more corporate. But not because corporations are driving prices up, but because big corporations can keep prices down. The local economy in Richmond is an upper-middle class boutique economy mostly dealing in luxury goods and services.

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OrtizDupri t1_jeb1eba wrote

The Bowleros around here are just rebranded whatevers - they might have one night a week that they do black lights, but 99% of the time they're just a regular boring old bowling alley. Just went the other night (Tuesday) and paid $3 a game and had the same regular bowling experience as back in the old days. Still have league nights where everyone shows up and drinks cheap beer and all the regular lights are on, etc.

Good nachos though.

> There are no working middle class-ish entertainment options because the working middle class has been steadily drying up in this country in a way that is unsustainable.

I generally do agree with this, but I also wonder if our definitions of middle class differ (I would say based on The Mill's menu that it is firmly a middle class establishment).

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