Restaurant in Georgia charging customers a fee for 'bad parenting' | Hacker News Reader

Restaurant in Georgia charging customers a fee for 'bad parenting'

abc7.com

20 pointslxm22 comments

They should simply ask them to leave if they can't keep their kids in line. If parents can exchange social shame for a fee, I'd expect a lot more bad behavior to be tolerated.

This reminds me of the Israeli day care that instituted a 'late pickup fee' and found that suddenly everyone was simply paying it, where they had previously made a real effort to be there on time.

I’ve heard the same about crèches in The Netherlands.

In my experience late pickup fees work as intended, this is the first I've heard of anything to the contrary.

It's one of the most famous Freakonomics stories: https://freakonomics.com/2013/10/what-makes-people-do-what-t.... It intuitively makes sense but I don't think you can draw any universal conclusions from just this study.

It is an anecdote, not exactly something reproduced multiple times in controlled experiments.

My daycare has a fee if youre 30 minutes late, but also a 3 strikes policy. So this doesnt escalate. Most places there are more people looking for daycares than slots (especially for very young kids) so they can be choosy.

In the story, the parents kept kids in line. The owner disapproved of tablet usage.

I'm from this area!

I feel like this is partly publicity, and partly some anti-tourism sentiment. The North Georgia mountains have had a huge explosion in tourism over the last 5 or so years. And with remote work everyone from Atlanta is moving up there. Blueridge used to be a 2 restaurant town and now no-one can afford to live there anymore.

Thanks for confirming. I went up to Elijay last year and was blown away by how busy it's gotten.

Looked at the place's reviews in Google maps: https://maps.app.goo.gl/PdYt2Yezq5if8wH78 Looks like they have a dog porch too? Do the dogs get the $50 charge if they are barking?

Also, indoors on this place suffers the same problem almost every other modern restaurant has, there's absolutely no sound dampening whatsoever. All hard surfaces, MAXIMIZE THE NOISE. Hard of hearing/elderly people I know complain all the time about this, can't hear yourself think because sound echoing off walls/ceiling/floor everywhere.

I expected something nicer looking. This looks like the kind of place I would normally expect to be a good place to take kids.

I think dog owners get away with quite a hell of a lot. If you want to bring your dog out to a restaurant, you should probably take on the responsibility of ensuring it's as unlikely as possible that it'll be disruptive. Likewise on hiking trails, or literally anywhere in public, don't bring your dog if you're not prepared to pick up its shit. If you can't handle that trivial task, then maybe don't own a dog.

Cats get a pass because they can handle themselves and are better animals.

I was with you 100% until you said cats are better animals.

That made it 200%?

I would have been in pretty big trouble if I was not polite, respectful, and seated at the table when I was a kid, likely incurring extra chores and not being allowed to go to the library or play outside. Going to a restaurant was a pretty rare special occasion and a real treat.

Re: the negative reviews – it is interesting how many parents of disruptive kids don't seem to notice that their kids are being noisy jerks.

I guess your aspirations drop to the level that you feel like achieving

This is one of those things where I'm sorta sympathetic to the idea here, but depending on how it is done I very much might NOT be sympathetic to it.

If a restaurant doesn't want kids there, there are usually subtle ways to sorta let them know. And I wonder if they're trying to change how the place is perceived, that's hard if the locals already expect it is more of a family place.

What if the restaurant wants only well behaved kids there?

I'm not opposed to that.

> “The owner came out and told me he was adding $50 to my bill because of my children's behavior. My kids watched a tablet until the food arrived, ate their food and my wife took them outside while I waited and paid the bill.”

This sounds like less about shaming the kids for their behavior, but more about shaming the parents for what the owner considers “bad parenting”.

A kid watching a tablet is definitely not going to disrupt other guests or the people running the restaurant, but could definitely be considered (by the owner) “bad parenting”.

>A kid watching a tablet is definitely not going to disrupt other guests

I don't know about you but I've definitely been sitting next to a table of kids, each with their own tablet, with the volume completely unrestrained. It's incredibly annoying to hear Bluey, Flappy Bird, and Fortnite going all at the same time.

Sounds like the Soup Nazi [0] - good soup, but...

[0] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAmaJkME2m4

Reply on news.ycombinator.com