Not sure I fully agree on fair price. $25 is their top of the line menu option and it is not even a decent cut of meat. Steak on a railroad dining car…if it was me, I would charge $40-45, increasing the size of the portion slightly. Definitely increase the quality and the size of the side dishes. If you notice Amtrak scrimps on the sides as well and they are the cheapest part of the meal.
Filet Mignon with one side, which is yet to be seen or cooked in a Amtrak Diner should be priced $55-60…$5 extra for the specialized toppings or crowns (mushrooms, blue cheese, etc).
Fish if the served it baked (which they will never do because it takes skill to prep and cook and they are probably afraid of bones), should be fresh, fair sized portion and at a minimum be $20-25.
There should not be a Hamburger, Hot Dog, Chicken Nuggets, Mac & Cheese on the menu as a meal…thats snack bar food. The fact they sell that cheap crap in the diner tells you Amtrak Food Services is confused about what should be sold where and what their target market should be. Amtrak is just looking at the Dining Car as a food dispenser not as a Dining experience.
Now finish all that and if your paying someone a living wage to be a table server, at least train them for the part, get rid of the rudeness, the 15-20 trips back and forth to serve a table of 4…and lets see some smiles and nice conversation. Also train them to put the table
Thanks all for an interesting stream, but should I judge from the lack of comment that no one sees a role for any sort of experiment with internet-ordered food from local caterers on the Indian model?
The Indian Railways are among the largest and most heavily patronized in the world, so of course they offer economies of scale not practical here. But this service is to be offered at 403 stations, from multiple caterers and does not require really long stops, nor the recreation of the Harvey Houses and the offer includes hot meals in multiple cuisines–not just Subway sandwiches.
Personally, yes, I think it is worth at least considering.
I also think it might be at least possible to arrange at least limited dining-car service of more ‘upscale’ meals that have been sourced and at least prepped by local people ‘to Internet order’ and then passed to the train crew at a stop shortly before service. This would be particularly applicable to “special order” food (for example strict kosher or GFCF) that would be difficult for a typical commissary and crew to execute properly for a reasonable amount of time and cost.
On one trip last year,weI left Salt Lake City about four hours late, and I ate dinner in the diner before we arrived in Sacramento–and when I returned home, we were six or seven hours late arriving in Salt Lake City from Chicago.
I do not see that such a plan should be entertained.
In the past, somebody proposed that all diner food should be outsorced to local sources en route and picked up to serve. This would customize within some range of options, such as a variety of popular ethnic cuisines, such as Tex-Mex, Chinese, Italian, etc. rather than just ‘American’ as seen on train menus 60 years ago. Times change.
It’s doable on a mass scale and I thought of this when I had a fast casual restaurant at a mall. I could setup a contract to contract business with a high school kid, he could manage the entire delivery operation. I would discount my sandwiches to his delivery service easily by 20-25%, and he could add a small delivery charge on top which would make his end profitable on a per meal basis as well as increasing my own sales volume using existing labor. The 20-25% off the top of the sandwich would not be a huge sacrifice financially to me but would ensure I got priority over other vendors in case he wanted to apply his delivery service to other food service joints. (there are other firms starting to enter this space like “grub hub” and a few others").
Then you can also expand this to catering as well. Where catering is profitable is it charges on a per head basis instead of per meal. In the case of my product one meal can feed 2-3 people if you buy the large size. So the pricing change with catering from per product to per head makes it very financially lucrative.
With a fast casusal submarine shop. 60% of it’s business model should be delivery and catering and only 40%
You know, our 125-year-old format for serving food on the train is kind of tried and true. The problem is not with the format, which is a model of efficiency, but with ignorant Congress people who do not understand it – probably never having ridden – and who insist on pinching pennies with Amtrak (so they can be profligate everywhere else).
Most of the alternatives that have been offered, here and other times on the forum, seem to me tortured and fraught with all kinds of potential problems, the most serious of which would be passengers going without food.
While that would have been a problem in the 1990’s. You can track Amtrak train status on the internet now and even programatically link to it and update another application like food ordering with the Amtrak train progress site. For a 70-100 person order you only need 1.5 to 2 hours advance notice, after it is cooked you can place in a warming oven where it will keep up to a few more hours. Even if you threw all that away and had to recook it a second time from scratch…with fast casual food your still making a profit with 70-100 clients with 50% waste.
I have heard about concern over late or unpredictable trains…absolutely a zero issue today with at least a fast casual business. I can call more crew in at a moments notice as well as lay them off, most folks 25 and under are absolutely that flexible with their schedules and take it in stride when they work at a fast food place that the labor force sometimes flexes with unpredictable business. Most of them could care less about showing up for work then being sent home right away…as long as they get 40 total hours in a week.
How many other 125-year old business models are still used? Amtrak’s food service model has been neither a model of efficiency nor good cuisine [with the ossible exception of the Auto-Train]. Why not consider developing the notion CM&StP and others are suggesting?
And you say this with a straight face, knowing that dining-car service has almost always been an extreme ‘loss-leader’ cost-wise?
It was a fine thing to justify this back in the day when it was possible to justify the extreme cost on the basis of ‘customer retention’ or repeat loyalty … and make up the difference in other ways, including shipper preference. I think very few of these reasons still apply to Amtrak food service, and it might be highly interesting to see what the ‘take rate’ and profitability from an outsourced fast-casual options program … even including that which is finish-prepared and served in a dining-car setting … might turn out to be.
This in distinction from the idea of providing less-formal meals via the “app” system that was the original focus of this thread, which beats precast frozen food heated in a microwave all hollow almost regardless of how much “quality” or “convenience” that approach provides.
I do agree that some ‘onboard’ provisioning should be made, in part for the reasons Johnny brought up (unexpected severe delays between points, especially in areas where ‘van delivery’ to the train could not be made either) – but I have to wonder whether modern political and economic forces will continue to allow this under the current ‘profitability mandate’ that is apparently being enforced on Amtrak service.
In brief, I think the argument is going to come down to an extension of the Silver Star approach, where if the diner can’t show at least a paper profit it will be abolished where it does not. And that would be a shame.
We’ve already determined that it would not ‘pay’ a fast-casual-derived “service company” to run
While it is true it would be cost prohibitive for them to staff on the train and deliver to the seat unless the train remained stopped for an extended period of time. They could easily cater to the train running through their town and deliver to the train or even train car (they are numbered on the outside and so are the seats on the inside) as I think the OP was asking about. Who would deliver the food on the train is a matter that would need research or further discussion. Having the delivery person board the train I think would lead to other issues.
This is also in response to Schlimm, 2 posts above. (I’m sorry that my primitive ability to maneuver around here doesn’t allow me to ‘stack’ quotes.)
For heaven’s sake, what has changed in the requirements of the service in 125 years? Then and now, the model requires on-board preparation and serving of food.
Sure, this costs more than service at one of Milw’s restaurants. You want expensive? How about a restaurant on the Moon? Yet there too there would be an idiot like John Mica challenging the high cost to generate and serve a hamburger.
I don’t care if a diner meal can no longer be justified on extraneous grounds such as showboating for shippers. It is an essential component of 79-mph rail passenger transportation. Nobody on here or on other threads has demonstrated yet how it can be delivered more efficiently or even necessarily more cheaply.
And reliably? Forget it.
Certainly none of these bright ideas has been demonstrated historically – for 125 weeks, let alone 125 years.
Fred. Times have really changed.** Nobody has really tried the alternatives batted around on here. Very few people will pay 40-60 dollars for dinner in the Amtrak diner. It’s time for innovation or food service will die.
** Imagine how much anything like this would cost now!! “The Christmas menu for the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway in 1882 listed the following items: Hunter’s Soup, Salmon with Hollandaise Sauce, Boned Pheasant in Aspic Jelly, Chicken Salad, Salmis Prairie Chicken, Oyster Patties, Rice Croquette, Roast Beef, English Ribs of Beef, Turkey with Cranberry Sauce, Stuffed Suckling Pig with Applesauce, Antelope Steak with Currant Jelly, potatoes, green peas, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, Mince Pie, Plum Pudding, Cake, Ice Cream, Fruits and coffee.”
YOu don’t have to go back that far. The best name trains just before 1 May 1971 had equally fine menues, in my opinion.
And the Rio Grande Zephyr and the Southern Crescent afterward!
I moved to Jerusalem before Acelas replaced Metroliners. But I found first-class precooked food on Metroliners good enough to enjoy the meal and the trip. I do think that national-chain quality restaurants can provide excellent food for long-distance trains and save a lot of money. The few times I have had the opportunity to fly first class on airlines, I have really enjoyed the meals. Uniformly on Air France in the 1960s and often on El Al into the 90s I even enjoyed excellent meals in tourist class. Some on-board supervision and continuity by Amtrak employees will still be essential, but I don;t think paying four or five people to sleep on trains just for food preperation makes sense in the 21st Century.
Look at the floor plan of a typical one-car dining car, 80-feet long. No vestibules. The kitchen is approximately 35 feet long and seven feet wide. Of that seven feet, about three feet is aisle or space for cooks, servers-dishwahsers to stand. So you have four feet by 35 feet, by seven feet in height to devote to cookinig, refrigerating, and storage, approximately 1000 (980) cubic feet. Some storage is of courese in refrigeration. Because of clever design, no waisted space, there was probably more refirgeraiton area and more protected storage area than in an average medium-sized restaurant. Two-unit diners and high-level diners had even more space, of course.
Some dining cars had storage pantries as well I have seen touring through the former shells as they come up for sale. They seemed to have a little more prep area than a fast casual restaurant would normally have but they do have more appliances. Most fast casual places focus on specific areas. Some of those old Dining car seems to have every type of appliance imaginable including deep fryers, coffee makers, more than one type of oven. Saw one with a char grill even.
Note fast casual restaurants will deliberately avoid specific areas. Jimmy Johns (no baking or cooking), Subway (no frying), Charley’s (no cold sandwiches, Breakfest or Dissert), Cousins (no frying or dissert, no baking), etc. Done to save on money spent for kitchen, prep, training and insurance. BTW, state law in most states, you have to be at least 18 years old to operate a food processor to slice vegetables.