$73 per person for 4th of July food? Yeah right

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Blue Collar Guy

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Here we go again, Where do these people get these numbers from? 500k for medical expenses, now its $73 per person for hot dog and a burger.Americans to spend $7.1 billion on Fourth of July activities. My mother in laws 2nd husband was wealthy. He knew how to throw a 4th of July party. It happened to be his mothers birthday as well. He pulled out all the stops, burgers, hot dogs, shrimp cocktail, steaks(rib eyes), booze, beer soda you name it. As usual I got the 2 am left overs because I always got stuck working the holiday:(. But even he didnt spend $73 a person.
 
Blue Collar Guy said:
Here we go again, Where do these people get these numbers from? 500k for medical expenses, now its $73 per person for hot dog and a burger.Americans to spend $7.1 billion on Fourth of July activities. My mother in laws 2nd husband was wealthy. He knew how to throw a 4th of July party. It happened to be his mothers birthday as well. He pulled out all the stops, burgers, hot dogs, shrimp cocktail, steaks(rib eyes), booze, beer soda you name it. As usual I got the 2 am left overs because I always got stuck working the holiday:(. But even he didnt spend $73 a person.
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Check your math. Mine says 320 million people @ $22 each comes out to $7.1B. Not excessive, if you include the beer, fireworks, and trips to the hospital. :)
 
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The cited article says
Of those celebrating the Fourth of July, 162 million people will take part in a cookout of picnic, spending an average of $73 dollars per person just for food.
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I'm assuming that includes a lot of alcohol, and maybe some expensive steaks and a lot of sides that will largely wind up in the trash.
 
I spent $11 on a big club sandwich with fries and a diet Coke, at the bar down the street. That's including tax and tip. Then I brought half the sandwich and fries home for dinner. Frank did the same. That's a lot more than we usually eat, but what can I say, it's a holiday. (burp!)

Guess we are cheapskates by comparison with the average American. :D Apparently eating at a sports bar is way cheaper than a cookout.
 
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Blue Collar Guy said:
Here we go again, Where do these people get these numbers from? 500k for medical expenses, now its $73 per person for hot dog and a burger.Americans to spend $7.1 billion on Fourth of July activities. My mother in laws 2nd husband was wealthy. He knew how to throw a 4th of July party. It happened to be his mothers birthday as well. He pulled out all the stops, burgers, hot dogs, shrimp cocktail, steaks(rib eyes), booze, beer soda you name it. As usual I got the 2 am left overs because I always got stuck working the holiday:(. But even he didnt spend $73 a person.
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We usually invite the whole neighborhood over for Wagyu steaks and Dom Perignon big gulps. Maybe I'm bringing up the average.......NOT!
 
W2R said:
I spent $11 on a big club sandwich with fries and a diet Coke, at the bar down the street. That's including tax and tip. Then I brought half the sandwich and fries home for dinner. Frank did the same. That's a lot more than we usually eat, but what can I say, it's a holiday. (burp!)

Guess we are cheapskates by comparison with the average American. :D Apparently eating at a sports bar is way cheaper than a cookout.
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I got you beaten. I made the chicken dish for less than $5. Garlic and rosemary are from the garden. Abundant fresh tomatoes from my garden. It's fresh and free.
 
MichaelB said:
Check your math. Mine says 320 million people @ $22 each comes out to $7.1B. Not excessive, if you include the beer, fireworks, and trips to the hospital. :)
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Did you read the article? Its says 73 per person for food. 3rd paragrah "Of those celebrating the Fourth of July, 162 million people will take part in a cookout of picnic, spending an average of $73 dollars per person just for food. Many people - 44% will watch fireworks. 14% will see a parade." What link did you look at? Mine says nothing about 320 million etc?
 
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That article was written by a writing bot with bad grammar and poor math skills. But yeah, they do mention the $73, even if it doesn't add. Peace .. :)
 
MichaelB said:
That article was written by a writing bot with bad grammar and poor math skills. But yeah, they do mention the $73, even if it doesn't add. Peace .. :)
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They also stated that only 162 million people went to cook-outs. Maybe that is responsible for some of the discrepancy. I didn't check it very closely, but possibly the author's math may be a little wonky. At $73 each for each of 162 million people, $11.8 billion.
 
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Fedup said:
I got you beaten. I made the chicken dish for less than $5. Garlic and rosemary are from the garden. Abundant fresh tomatoes from my garden. It's fresh and free.
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I sprung for corn on the cob, 10 for 2 dollars (we bought 6). Nathans hot dogs(hahaha go figure) 2.99, potato rolls 1.99 about 2 pounds of hamburger 2.49 a pound and another 1.99 for those potato buns. Home made cole slaw Id say 4 bucks. A bottle of soda , a buck. Bride had 1 mikes hard lemonade 1.50? OK lets include dessert apple pie 2.99 (the one with crumbs on top.) later some coffee another 2 bucks? Mustand? salt and pepper lets bid big and throw another 50 cents in. Yeah this was cheaper than most of my dinners. 12 bucks a person. Oh by the way, half of the meat is still here uneaten. But Ill throw it all in the mix.
 
W2R said:
Guess we are cheapskates by comparison with the average American. :D Apparently eating at a sports bar is way cheaper than a cookout.
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That's where we are going tonight (Sports bar). No big parties in a 55+ community (early bed times :LOL:) and the "kids" have plans without us. We will spend around $25 for both of us including tip.:cool:
 
aja8888 said:
That's where we are going tonight (Sports bar). No big parties in a 55+ community (early bed times :LOL:) and the "kids" have plans without us. We will spend around $25 for both of us including tip.:cool:
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Sounds good! We don't especially like parties anyway so for us it was just right.
 
Just goes to show we can argue over anything. :)

Here's the press release from the NRF. https://nrf.com/resources/consumer-data/independence-day

The $73 figure is per household, not per person - that's the way it was in prior years announcements . In another, earlier press release, same author, they do mention again a $73 per person (up from last year's $71 per household). No matter how you do the math, $7.1B divided among 350M, 216M, or 166M people doesn't come close to $73 per person, but it does add up as a per-family number.

I think CNN and the NRF need employees with better writing and math skills.
 
If you disagree with the number maybe you didn't go to the grocery store last week.
 
MichaelB said:
Just goes to show we can argue over anything. :)

Here's the press release from the NRF. https://nrf.com/resources/consumer-data/independence-day

The $73 figure is per household, not per person - that's the way it was in prior years announcements . In another, earlier press release, same author, they do mention again a $73 per person (up from last year's $71 per household). No matter how you do the math, $7.1B divided among 350M, 216M, or 166M people doesn't come close to $73 per person, but it does add up as a per-family number.

I think CNN and the NRF need employees with better writing and math skills.
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Better thinking skills too! They should be embarrassed that they said $73/person is more than $71/household, especially with people checking the articles before publication, but I'll bet they aren't. Personally I think everyone on this forum could do better than that even if we were blind drunk or sleepwalking or both.

Thanks for the explanation. I was sitting here with a spreadsheet wondering what gives, and looking like this little emoticon: :confused:
 
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My excellent cookout (baby back ribs, corn on the cob, and baked beans) worked out to a little over $10 per person, but that includes the beer.

Damn! Looks like I wound up beneath my means again.

Happy Independence Day, everyone!
 
I thought $73 sounds like per household because I was self congratulated myself for beating that price tag. I spent less than $10 for the whole family. Haha

@BCG, I didn't buy corns at one store we shopped yesterday because they didn't look good. We just got back from our trip so we only did a quick shop for milk and stuff.
 
braumeister said:
My excellent cookout (baby back ribs, corn on the cob, and baked beans) worked out to a little over $10 per person, but that includes the beer.

Damn! Looks like I wound up beneath my means again.

Happy Independence Day, everyone!
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Sounds delicious, and thrifty! Plenty of beer (or diet Coke, for me) is important, to help wash down those baby back ribs, corn on the cob, and baked beans. :D
 
I'm estimating we spent about that ($70). We fed seven tonight.
 
And like Braumeister pointed out-"Happy Independence Day" not "Happy Fourth of July" like the article stated.
 
I tried to get to average. Really i did. After the Pet parade and a while walking (no shopping) at the art fair after the parade we decide to go grab a bit to eat. We went to 7 (SEVEN!) joints ranging from pizza to BBQ. All closed. All local joints. Not chains

Finally at the last one Mrs Scrapr says....You want to grill up some brats? Me: You betcha
 
We celebrated Uncle Sam's birthday with lobsters, oysters on the half shell, potato salad with smoked salmon, grilled asparagus, champagne and strawberry rhubarb pie. Im sure it was over 75 per person.
 
Gumby said:
We celebrated Uncle Sam's birthday with lobsters, oysters on the half shell, potato salad with smoked salmon, grilled asparagus, champagne and strawberry rhubarb pie. Im sure it was over 75 per person.
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Very nice! That's a bit above and beyond the expected for Independence Day, but yummy.

I slow cooked a big slab of spare ribs to go with CobCorn, fries, a couple of beers and mojito each. One way of looking at it is that we saved money, since we didn't crack open our usual bottle of Pinot. OTOH, if you count the hours spent "grilling" (well, actually mostly reading), it adds up!

Luckily, a slab yields two dinners for us. :LOL:
 
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