Thursday, June 11, 2026 | London 16°C · Overcast
DailyGlimpse

Pay what you wish: the restaurant where customers can eat for free – if their conscience lets them

Lifestyle
June 11, 2026 · 1:33 AM
Pay what you wish: the restaurant where customers can eat for free – if their conscience lets them

Pay what you wish: the restaurant where customers can eat for free – if their conscience lets them | Money | The Guardian

Skip to main contentSkip to navigation

Close dialogue 1/1 Next image Previous image Toggle caption

Support the Guardian

Fund the free press with $5 per month

Support usSupport us

Print subscriptions

Newsletters

Sign in

US

The Guardian - Back to home The Guardian

  • [x]

Show more Hide expanded menu

  • [x]

‘How much? That’s up to you, my friend.’ Photograph: Posed by models; MoMo Productions/Getty Images

View image in fullscreen

‘How much? That’s up to you, my friend.’ Photograph: Posed by models; MoMo Productions/Getty Images

Pass notesMoney

Pay what you wish: the restaurant where customers can eat for free – if their conscience lets them

Ever since the Post Modern Times cafe in Minneapolis ditched its price list, half the customers have chosen not to pay. It’s still making a profit

Wed 10 Jun 2026 12.23 EDT Last modified on Wed 10 Jun 2026 12.53 EDT

Share

Prefer the Guardian on Google

Name: Pay what you wish.

Age: Popular since the 00s, but dating back to at least the 80s.

Appearance: That’s up to you, my friend.

**What do you mean, up to me?**Pay what you wish (PWYW) is a well-known, if not exactly common, pricing strategy whereby the buyer sets the price of a given commodity.

**Every buyer?**That’s right – you can choose to pay any amount, often as low as zero, or as high as …

**I choose zero.**That’s fine. Alternatively, you might select a price based on your assessment of what the commodity is worth, either generally or to you personally.

I don’t care what it’s worth**– I want it for free****!**Always a popular option. However, the underlying idea is to establish trust between a seller eager to provide value or expand market share, and a fair-minded buyer who …

**Zero, please.**OK, but you may change your mind once you’ve sampled the commodity and found it has value beyond …

**I ain’t changing my mind.****Which just shows it’s a flawed strategy for the seller. Can you give me an example of it proving to be anything other than a disaster?**Yes. The Post Modern Times cafe in Minneapolis recently moved from loss to profit after switching to a PWYW model.

**How can that possibly be?**As soon as the struggling cafe became a “free and donation-based” restaurant in January, business began booming.

**I’ll bet it did.**Now 40-50% of customers don’t pay, but the rest do.

**With numbers like that, how do they****manage to stay open?**In part it’s because running on donations means the cafe doesn’t have to pay tax on sales.

**Ah, the old tax angle. Sly.**And the staff are also volunteers working for shared tips and community donations.

**It sounds as if an awful lot of goodwill****is necessary to make this model work.**Well, it is Minneapolis: a friendly, liberal city united in – among other things – its staunch opposition to ICE agents targeting immigrants in the streets.

**Any other examples worth citing?**Museums such as the Met in New York use a PWYW entry fee for residents of the city and students. The fashion retailer Everlane tried a PWYW sale back in 2015. And Radiohead self-released their 2007 album In Rainbows as a PWYW download.

**How did that work out?**Research showed that 62% of fans paid nothing, and the average overall price per download was just $2.26.

**A failure then.**Not at all. It was still more than the share Radiohead would have got by selling at full price through iTunes (about $1.40).

Do say: “When it comes to charitable aims or promotional buzz, the PWYW model has its place.”

Don’t say: “More pie over here!”

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here

Explore more on these topics

Share

Reuse this content

Pass notes

Pass notes

  • ### Practice dates: should you swipe right on people you’re not attracted to? 1d ago
  • ### Loneliness influencers: why are people suddenly boasting about having no friends? 2d ago
  • ### Doomscrolling: is it really worth five years of your one wild and precious life? 3 Jun 2026
  • ### Solo-maxxing: gen Z is embracing single life – for a very sad reason 2 Jun 2026
  • ### Wanderlove: are we really more attractive and alluring on holiday? 1 Jun 2026
  • ### Lawnmower hum: why the sound of the summer could cost you £5,000 27 May 2026
  • ### Beach shades: where do you draw a line in the sand? 26 May 2026
  • ### Plus-ones: Taylor Swift’s decision to limit her wedding guest list could be a lesson to us all 25 May 2026

More from Lifestyle

More from Lifestyle

  • ### ‘Russian’ manicures are on the rise – but experts say a lot can go wrong 11h ago
  • ### Sonos, Wrangler, Asics: 23 very best Father’s Day deals in the US for every kind of dad 11h ago
  • ### Weight-loss drug users save more than £400 a year on food as take-up triples 12h ago
  • ### Belle Burden should have known: the more money, the more brutal the divorce 14h ago
  • ### ‘A big pouffy dress is not really me’: the brides who got wed in a suit – long before Dua Lipa 15h ago
  • ### Want to be my friend? There is one dining rule you must adhere to 16h ago106 106 comments
  • ### Should you send that midnight text? 11 essential rules for phone etiquette 17h ago303 303 comments
  • ### Sali Hughes on beauty: a new generation of setting sprays that work even on oily skin 17h ago
  • ### A moment that changed me: I climbed a tower aged nine, alone – and discovered how I wanted to live 20h ago

Most viewed

Most viewed

Most viewed Across the Guardian

  1. Former Louisiana mayor sentenced to 90 days over rape of 16-year-old boy

  2. The truth about my famous ‘Party girl Kate Moss’ shot: Greg Brennan’s best photograph

  3. Live Middle East crisis live: US says second day of Iran strikes ‘completed’; Tehran claims it has targeted US base in Bahrain

  4. Live Mike Johnson attempts to defend Trump after president says ‘I love the inflation’ – live

  5. American teenager Lutkenhaus stuns Olympic champion as Gout learns lesson

  6. Trump says ‘I love the inflation’ as rate rises to 4.2% amid Iran war pressure

  7. Car bomb kills senior Russian military official near Moscow

  8. It was Britain’s most expensive house. Why is its only resident a homeless man who lives on the porch?

  9. No fairytale: what happened to the real children behind fiction’s best-loved characters?

  10. US navy member sentenced to 44 years in prison for killing female sailor

Most viewed in Money

  1. Pay what you wish: the restaurant where customers can eat for free – if their conscience lets them

  2. UK minister defends changes to student loans as criticism mounts

  3. ‘This is where people with staggering wealth end up’: who will buy Britain’s most expensive house?

  4. Salary sacrifice: max out this pension tax break while you can

  5. BT Digital Voice switched off our vital phone line

  6. ScottishPower sent six cheques addressed to my late brother

  7. Homes for sale in England with great gardens for parties – in pictures

  8. ‘Poisoned’ AI: the ChatGPT shopping scams that lead to fake websites

  9. Democratic-led states sue to block student loan caps by Trump administration

  10. ‘Hello pervert’: the sextortion scam claiming to have videoed you

Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning

Sign up for our email

Support the Guardian

Available for everyone, funded by readers

Support us

Back to top

© 2026 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.(dcr)

← More Lifestyle View original