A bottle of Veuve Clicquot Champagne might set you back $40 at BevMo. But at a white-tablecloth restaurant, expect to pay more than double that amount.
It's no secret that restaurants boost their wine prices. But in an industry well known for its relatively low profit margins – typically 8 to 12 percent – some things have to pay the bills.
So what besides booze are the most marked-up items on the menu? Buyers for restaurants say that fancy bottle of water with a price tag of more than $3 only costs the restaurant between 40 and 90 cents. Soda from the fountain sells for 20 times the restaurant's cost, and eight times more when it's served in a can. Pasta, pizza, eggs and that little mixed green salad are all a license to make money.
But with rising costs, those margins are tightening.
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