MythBusters Hollywood Studios: All Day Menus

We've done a few MythBusters style posts in the past, where we try to prove or disprove some myths about Disney's Hollywood Studios and this week the news of the 50's Prime Time Cafe and Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant changing over to all-day menus got us thinking about a new myth to try out.

We've done a few MythBusters style posts in the past, where we try to prove or disprove some myths about Disney's Hollywood Studios and this week the news of the 50's Prime Time Cafe and Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant changing over to all-day menus got us thinking about a new myth to try out.

The basic formula is I'll present a commonly held myth, discuss it and then declare it "Busted" (meaning it's false), "Plausible" (meaning it could be true) or "Confirmed" (which means it's true).

Myth: All-day menus are more expensive than restaurants with a lunch and dinner menu

The myth goes something like this: when there are lunch and dinner menus, the lunch menu tends to be cheaper than the dinner menu and between the two menus, there's more options to choose from.  When you go to an all-day menu, inevitably some items from the lunch and dinner menu don't make it onto the new menu and thus, there's less choices to choose from overall.

We will start with the cost question and to prove or disprove it, we will compare the prices of appetizers and entrees from the old lunch and dinner menus to their new menus.  We will calculate the average cost of an appetizer and entree for each restaurant for lunch and dinner and then calculate the same for the all day menu and see what change, if any, occurs.

50's Prime Time Average Appetizer Lunch Menu cost: $7.69
50's Prime Time Average Entree Lunch Menu cost: $15.39

50's Prime Time Average Appetizer Dinner Menu cost: $7.69
50's Prime Time Average Entree Dinner Menu cost: $18.54

50's Prime Time Average Appetizer All-Day Menu cost: $7.99
50's Prime Time Average Entree All-Day Menu cost: $17.93

Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant Average Appetizer Lunch Menu cost: $8.07
Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant Average Entree Lunch Menu cost: $16.67

Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant Average Appetizer Dinner Menu cost: $8.07
Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant Average Entree Dinner Menu cost: $18.49

Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant Average Appetizer All-Day Menu cost: $8.74
Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant Average Entree All-Day Menu cost: $16.74

Based on this data, we can get some interesting results.  In both cases, the average cost of appetizers went up as well as the average cost of lunch entrees.  However, the average cost of dinner entrees actually went down in price.  

For those that still want to believe in the myth, you could make the argument that future price hikes would result in the menu becoming more expensive faster than if there were a lunch and dinner menu since the price for lunch has been bumped up on average already.  So it seems this myth isn't without some merit of being true.