• by Teresa Buyikian , September 11, 2024

During election times, the economy is top of mind for most every American. And who can blame us? With goods and services costing an average of 20% more than they did pre-pandemic, plus rising gas and housing prices, there's not a lot left for anything other than necessities.

And restaurants, especially QSRs, get hit with a double whammy: not considered a “necessity,” they are still both a frequent good AND a service for millions of people, affected positively or negatively by all ends of the supply and demand chain.

Broken down, though, what exactly does that mean to consumers’ day-to-day life? Exactly how much more is it costing us to eat lunch out today over last year?

Toast, a restaurant digital platform provider, this week published its Q2 2024 Restaurant Trends Report: “The Cost of Going Out to Lunch,” which examined restaurant transactions in 20 U.S. cities along with popular lunch food trends verses 2023. In the report, Toast analyzed aggregated data from “selected cohorts of restaurants and in select U.S. cities using the company’s platform,” which services an estimated 120,000 restaurant locations as of June 30, 2024.

The study found that in Q2 2024, QSR guests paid an average of $11.45 for a burger meal, up almost 5% from 2023. Sandwiches and wraps were up equally near 5%, landing at an average of $11.26.  More expensive were bowls at $12.98, up just over 4.5%. Also higher priced are salads at $11.42, yet the greens only saw a 2.7 % increase over last year. One of California’s most popular choices, burritos, are on the lower price end, at $10.74, but still increased 4.3% over 2023. 

And those higher prices have made an impact. “There’s a noticeable decrease in consumers dining out, especially with consumers that have a household income under $75,000,” said Executive Director of Vericast's restaurant division, Dana Baggett, in recent report published by Money. “The steadily increasing cost of dining out is testing the limits of what consumers can and will spend.”

Another significant finding in the Toast report was the noticeable shift from dinner and late-night dining to often less-expensive breakfast mealtimes. “In the majority of the cities Toast explored, restaurants saw an increase in transaction counts during breakfast hours (4 A.M. to 11 P.M.) and a decrease in transactions during dinner hours (4 P.M. to 9 P.M.) and late night (9 P.M. to 12 A.M.).” Topping the list of cities seeing the most 2024 growth YOY during breakfast hours were Richmond (+15%), Oklahoma City (+11%), Indianapolis (+8%), and Philadelphia (+8%).

Also of note is that the most popular items for Q2 2024 were sandwiches and wraps, which are also two of the higher priced menu items. This rings true for most states except California, Nevada, Oregon and Texas, where the lower priced tacos came in at number one. The most expensive menu items were burgers, bowls and noodles/ramen, while tacos, fries, and hot dogs were the least pricey.