OHIO — While many are getting back to sit-down dining, experts say inflation is causing people to tip less.
The idea of tipping started in the 1960s to reward good service from your server. According to a recent poll by the finance website Bankrate, about 30% of their test consumers felt like tipping culture has gotten out of control.
From 2019 to 2023, the number of people who say they always tip at restaurants has fallen from 77% to 65%. Consumer research expert Jacob Hiler of Ohio University said this could be because of a decline in what consumers consider excellent service.
“The policy of tipping doesn’t actually ensure service excellence,” said Hiler. “It actually just ensures service adequacy in most cases. And the reason for that is, is that as a motivational tool for waitstaff, you can work ten times harder, but the likelihood of you receiving, you know, ten times more value in your tip is highly unlikely.”
While tipping for some restaurants has been on the decline, others say they are just seeing things return to pre-pandemic levels. Many consumers tipped more generously during the pandemic, trying to pay it forward for those who were out of work, but the price tag to eat out wasn’t as high as it is today.
Don Dalton, chief operating officer of the popular Midwest food chain Swensons, said that tipping hasn’t been the issue as much as getting people to come in and eat versus ordering on third-party websites like Doordash and Grubhub. He said they’ve had to focus on marketing to get people back on the lot.
“The pandemic forced us into that, and we’ve found it to be a valuable piece of our business, but that balance of, you know, that customer now choosing between third party delivery or coming in and having a ‘lot experience,” said Dalton. “We really focus on our weekends and coming out and making it memorable.”
While some restaurants in California, Indiana and Louisiana have opted to just pay their wait staff more instead of tipping, Hiler said he doubts the trend will go nationwide.
“The restaurants push the cost of hiring waitstaff and maintaining that waitstaff at the restaurant onto the end consumer so that their overall costs can essentially be lower,” said Hiler. “So what happens is that they can staff the restaurant with a lot of wait staff, and it’s not really affecting the restaurant as a whole. If, for instance, you know, during a lunch period or a dinner period, they don’t have as many customers because now they’re only paying out $3 and something an hour per waitstaff.”
According to the latest consumer price index released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the U.S. annual inflation slowed to 3% in June. This means consumers might not have to worry about prices continuing to increase as sharply as they have over the past couple of years.
