Wang Yuanyuan
RESTAURANT reservations for Spring Festival Eve on Feb. 2 have started one month earlier than previous years despite price increases of 30 to 40 percent.
Compared with last year, the price for a 2011 reunion dinner had increased by at least 30 percent because of sharp increase in food prices, restaurants said yesterday.
The minimum charge at Shengji Restaurant in Futian District was 1,680 yuan (US$252) per table, 400 yuan more than last year. A medium-sized eatery in Futian District, Meili Restaurant, had increased minimum prices by 300 yuan per table to 800 yuan with a 10-percent service charge.
Other restaurants had not increased minimum charges for the Spring Festival Eve dinner in fear of losing customers, but dishes would not be as good as last year, said Chen Shaohua with the city s catering industry association.
Unlike previous years, many restaurants, such as Shengji Restaurant, Xihuchuntian Restaurant and Caigenxiang Restaurant, announced minimum charges instead of providing menus. Food prices have increased too fast and many restaurants are afraid they will lose money if commodity prices keep increasing to the end of the year. They have started taking booking but menus would not be decided until shortly before the festival, Chen said.
Because the Spring Festival Eve dinner is traditionally the most important occasion on the Chinese calendar, many people were still choosing to book tables in advance.
I had no choice but to accept the price hike. After all it is not easy to prepare a whole table of dishes for a big family and you will not save much money as food prices at markets have also increased a lot, a resident, Chi Xiaolin, said.
Restaurants started promoting Spring Festival Eve dinners a month earlier than in previous years. We have had a lot of customers asking about reserving dinners since the end of November, so we started planning earlier to meet the demand, said Wu Zhonglin, a manager at a Maojia Restaurant in Luohu District.
Despite the Spring Festival still being six weeks away, reservations are selling fast. One example was Jiangnan Chefs at the Mixc where there is a minimum charge of 2,580 per table. Despite the cost, 60 percent of the private rooms at Jiangnan Chefs had been booked out, while two-thirds of the tables at the Maojia Restaurant on Chunfeng Road were reserved.
Because a growing number of families decided to eat the festive dinner at restaurants in recent years, there would still be two or three sittings at the restaurants. Normally, the first sitting is from 4 to 7 p.m., while the second starts after 7:30 p.m. Some restaurants, such as Miaoshi Chuancai Restaurant in Futian District, will start the first sitting at noon.
