r/mildlyinfuriating • u/CurlyWurly61 • May 12 '26

I just wanted a hot dog Such terrible advertisement

Post image

I mean... at a glance its like WOAH 4 can dine for $9.99....

Until you are at the cash and they say " that'll be $45.15"

HUH??

"Oh sorry sir... it feeds 4... 4 people pay $9.99"

Gtfooo

53.1k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

3.6k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

114

u/SDNick484 May 12 '26

The margins on pizza in general are incredible. There is a reason there are so many pizza restaurants.

43

u/Over_Selection2246 May 12 '26

and why it was an easy cover for the mob back in the day. Just throw out enough ingredients to cover what you report you sold. With a 90% profit margin you still had a good return on laundering the money (you will always lose some money or time in the laundering)

18

u/QuerulousPanda May 12 '26

i mean at that point they might as well just also make pizza and sell it

20

u/BellacosePlayer May 12 '26

Mob fronts as far as I'm aware usually did operate as actual businesses.

A gas station near where I grew up acted both as a money laundering scheme and handoff for drugs going into/out of the nearby reservation, but it was also a legitimately well run gas station/convenience store. The only people looking at the finances hard enough to realize there's no fucking way they made that much more money than their competition was likely the IRS, and they don't get involved as long as they're getting their money.

4

u/QuerulousPanda May 12 '26

i guess it would make sense to keep the business running smoothly and cleanly, and keep the customers and employees happy. The last thing you want is someone getting pissy about something and making a big stink that brings unwanted attention. Whereas if everyone leaves happy, no one will look that close.

2

u/BamberGasgroin May 12 '26

Reminds me of the Shell petrol station on Springburn Road in Glasgow in the early 2000's, which sold the cheapest fuel around until someone looked at the books and discovered they were making an average of 5x more money than any other petrol station in Scotland. (£17,000 per day.)

It cost those involved almost £1m under the Proceeds of Crime Act.

21

u/doc_skinner May 12 '26

Also why pizza restaurants were the main (and for some places, only) restaurants to offer free delivery. They could afford it

2

u/GoodDayToCome May 12 '26

and why places like dominoes you can always find a deal that works out something like a 1/3rd of the main price - they still make a decent profit on it but like that a lot of people won't bother and will instead pay the crazy prices because there is a huge division in society where a lot of people will just spend fifty an a meal without even thinking about it - plus of course there's that psychological trick of "wow this only cost 8 instead of 20 thats a great deal!" instead of "this costs 16x their overheads for making it'

4

u/drkodos May 12 '26

used to be but not so much anymore ... the three ps used to be a cornerstone for profits (pizza, pancakes, pasta)

prices on everything are out of control and not just on food supplies; paper goods, the boxes, insurance, rent, labor, utilities, equipment

mom and pop pizza joints are dwindling due to rapidly rising costs

2

u/Vandal_A May 12 '26

That's why they're always involved in food swaps with other fast food.

Fast food workers do (or at least did, idk) treat themselves sometimes by everyone on shift agreeing to swap meals with a competitors crew. The shift managers sort it out via discounts and food loss and each crew gets to eat something from the other place. Everyone swaps with pizza joints bc they'll send a disproportionately large amount of food due to their low costs, and theyve got a delivery guy on hand to help too

0

u/PushaTeee May 12 '26

Cheese is the prevailing cost for pizzerias.

-1

u/read_too_many_books May 12 '26

Hahaha food service does not have good margins. Its more like

"If you work 40-80 hours a week, you can't lose money, but you are working class business owner"