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The Flat-Rate Pricing Paradox: Conflicting Effects of "“All-You-Can-Eat"” Buffet Pricing

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  • David R Just

    (Cornell University)

  • Brian Wansink

    (Cornell University)

Abstract

Are price and consumption independent in flat-rate price service contexts? A field experiment at an all-you-can-eat pizza restaurant shows that a 50%% discount on the price of the meal led customers to consume 27.9%% less pizza (2.95 versus 4.09 pieces). A second analysis indicated that individual taste ratings of this pizza tended to be inversely related to how much is consumed. One possible interpretation of these two findings is that individuals in a flat-rate (or fixed-price) context may consume the amount that enables them to get their money's worth rather than consuming until their marginal utility of consumption is 0. © 2011 The President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Suggested Citation

  • David R Just & Brian Wansink, 2011. "The Flat-Rate Pricing Paradox: Conflicting Effects of "“All-You-Can-Eat"” Buffet Pricing," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(1), pages 193-200, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:93:y:2011:i:1:p:193-200
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    1. Dimuthu Ratnadiwakara & Vijay Yerramilli, 2022. "Do Sunk Costs Affect Prices in the Housing Market?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(12), pages 9061-9081, December.
    2. Shakun D. Mago & Roman M. Sheremeta, 2019. "New Hampshire Effect: behavior in sequential and simultaneous multi-battle contests," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 22(2), pages 325-349, June.
    3. Quinn Keefer, 2021. "Sunk costs in the NBA: the salary cap and free agents," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 61(6), pages 3445-3478, December.
    4. Ronayne, David & Sgroi, Daniel & Tuckwell, Anthony, 2020. "Evaluating the Sunk Cost Effect," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 1269, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    5. Ronayne, David & Sgroi, Daniel & Tuckwell, Anthony, 2021. "Evaluating the sunk cost effect," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 186(C), pages 318-327.
    6. Eric Johnson & Suzanne Shu & Benedict Dellaert & Craig Fox & Daniel Goldstein & Gerald Häubl & Richard Larrick & John Payne & Ellen Peters & David Schkade & Brian Wansink & Elke Weber, 2012. "Beyond nudges: Tools of a choice architecture," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 23(2), pages 487-504, June.
    7. Ya-Hui Wang, 2014. "All You Can Eat: Behavioral Evidence From Taiwan," International Journal of Management and Marketing Research, The Institute for Business and Finance Research, vol. 7(2), pages 29-37.
    8. Jeremy van Dijk & Mehdi Farsi & Sylvain Weber, 2020. "Travel mode choices in a greening market: the impact of electric vehicles and prior investments," IRENE Working Papers 20-04, IRENE Institute of Economic Research.
    9. Chao, Yong & Fernandez, Jose & Nahata, Babu, 2015. "Pay-what-you-want pricing: Can it be profitable?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 176-185.
    10. Sirikarn Phuchada & Phumsith Mahasuweerachai, 2022. "The Higher the Goal, the More You Eat: Reference Dependence In an “ALL-YOU-CAN-EAT†Restaurant," PIER Discussion Papers 185, Puey Ungphakorn Institute for Economic Research.
    11. Gregory Colson & Jay R. Corrigan & Carola Grebitus & Maria L. Loureiro & Matthew C. Rousu, 2016. "Which Deceptive Practices, If Any, Should Be Allowed in Experimental Economics Research? Results from Surveys of Applied Experimental Economists and Students," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 98(2), pages 610-621.
    12. Teck-Hua Ho & I. P. L. Png & Sadat Reza, 2018. "Sunk Cost Fallacy in Driving the World’s Costliest Cars," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(4), pages 1761-1778, April.
    13. Chao Ma, 2021. "Be Cautious In The Last Month: The Sunk Cost Fallacy Held By Car Insurance Policyholders," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 62(3), pages 1199-1236, August.
    14. Just, David R. & Gabrielyan, Gnel, 2018. "Influencing the food choices of SNAP consumers: Lessons from economics, psychology and marketing," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 309-317.
    15. Loureiro, Maria L. & Rahmani, Djamel, 2016. "The incidence of calorie labeling on fast food choices: A comparison between stated preferences and actual choices," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 22(C), pages 82-93.
    16. Fraiman, Daniel, 2022. "A self-organized criticality participative pricing mechanism for selling zero-marginal cost products," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    17. Quinn Andrew Wesley Keefer, 2021. "Did the 2011 Change to NFL Rookie Compensation Alter How Sunk Costs Affect Utilization?," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 22(4), pages 387-411, May.
    18. Pham, Matthew V. & Roe, Brian E., 2014. "The Effect of an Information Intervention on the Healthfulness of College Meal Plan Purchases in a Use-it or Lose-it Meal Plan Currency System," 2014 Annual Meeting, July 27-29, 2014, Minneapolis, Minnesota 170166, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    19. Kee, Jennifer & Segovia, Michelle S. & Saboury, Piruz & Palma, Marco A., 2022. "Appealing to generosity to reduce food calorie intake: A natural field experiment," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    20. Ortiz, Selena E. & Zimmerman, Frederick J. & Adler, Gary J., 2016. "Increasing public support for food-industry related, obesity prevention policies: The role of a taste-engineering frame and contextualized values," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 142-153.
    21. Keefer, Quinn A.W., 2019. "Decision-maker beliefs and the sunk-cost fallacy: Major League Baseball’s final-offer salary arbitration and utilization," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 75(PB).
    22. Rogge, Nicky, 2021. "When the cost has sunk: Measuring and comparing the sunk-cost bias in autistic and neurotypical persons," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    23. Chang, Kuo-Ping, 2019. "Behavioral Economics versus Traditional Economics: Are They Very Different?," MPRA Paper 96561, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    24. Loureiro, Maria L. & Rahmani, Djamal, 2013. "Calorie labeling and fast food choices in surveys and actual markets: some new behavioral results," 2013 Annual Meeting, August 4-6, 2013, Washington, D.C. 150622, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    25. Sezer Ülkü & Chris Hydock & Shiliang Cui, 2020. "Making the Wait Worthwhile: Experiments on the Effect of Queueing on Consumption," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(3), pages 1149-1171, March.

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