Restaurants should charge
for booking a table at peak times as well as for eating the meal. I'm telling
you this not just because I want to tell you something interesting which you
may not have considered, but also because what I'm now going to say serves to
explain well the economic concept of value, and why we would all be better off
if restaurants charged for booking a table at peak times.
It's obvious to everyone
that the laws of supply and demand factor in to the dining out experience. A
6pm booking on a Tuesday night at a restaurant that has been open for 10 years
is bound to be in much lower demand than a 7:30pm booking on a Saturday night
at a restaurant that has only been open a few weeks. That is why taking
bookings on a first come first serve basis distorts the true signals of value.
A couple that phones up
and books a table at random or a few friends who walk past and grab a table on
a whim may not value their table as much as people that would have paid an
extra surcharge to eat in there. Consequently, charging for table bookings
increases the chances that the people who most value a dining experience have
that experience, while at the same time leaving room for less discerning people
to choose other restaurants. Plus, if non-price sensitive people pay more at
peak times, price-sensitive people should find cheaper meals of the same
quality at non-peak times.
So why, then, don't
restaurants charge for booking a table? It could be for the same reason that hugely
popular concert tickets don't sell for more. But it's probably also the
case that popular individual restaurants that adopted this policy unilaterally would
place themselves at a disadvantage against other popular restaurants that chose
not to charge a booking fee. In all likelihood, this is why reservations do not
have the kind of prices that would allocate diners with restaurants more
optimally, and create extra societal value in doing so.
