klqkauai

Friends recently returned from a trip to Rome, Tuscany and Florence. They stated that they paid 13 Euros for a beer. Can this be true?

annhig

kiqkauai - how big a beer, and where?

when i was in southern Tuscany last year, the local newspaper was full of a story of a german couple paying €18 for a gelato in Florence, which sounded appalling, but the photo showed a huge ice cream with many flavours, cream and other additions which they had bought from a gelateria in a prime tourist spot. when i bought an ice-cream in Florence the following week from a little place round the back of Santa Croce, i paid €1.50 for a cone with 2 scoops.

Beer is the same - sit down in a tourist centre in a prime spot with a view and you'll pay through the nose. find a little bar in a less fashionable neighbourhood and stand by the bar, and you'll probably have some change from a €10 note.

HG001London

i would be surprised if it were true unless it was in a 5 star hotel or something right next to one of the main sites. In fact- no i cant believe 13 euros for a beer is even possible (maybe in paris!). I got a whole bottle of wine in Puglia for 5 euros and its even very nice! although on the other hand i doubt your friends are lying- they must have been in a very exclusive well located bar

jamikins

Beer is much more expensive than wine in Rome... Italy isn't a beer producing country really so it does make sense...wine is sometimes cheaper than a coke in Italy....

HG001London

yeah thats true- we have been pleasnatly surprised by the cost of wine in Italy- will always remember the shock we got sat in a restaurant in Naples and paying 2.5 euros for a litre of (nice!) wine. Boy they must get a shock when they come to London!

fmpden

It was a sucker play if they paid 13 Euro for a beer. You don't have or they don't know the full story. Even in the heart of Rome last year I ordered, by mistake, a large beer and received a full liter for 7E. But it was hot and I didn't have to order a refill.

annhig

a few years ago, desperate for a beer after a day in the Vatican museums, we sat down within a spit of San Pietro and paid €6 for a large beer [they wanted €4 for a small one, so we shared the larger version].

we thought this was a lot until we went to Toulouse later in the same year and were charged €10 for 2 small beers in the square. but that was "small beer" compared to what we were charged for beer and wine in Iceland.

DRJ

Speaking of London, several years ago I lunched with a good friend in DC who had just returned from London. He said that he had enjoyed his first $25 martini. I was shocked, I tell you! Shocked!

Even now, in NY City a few weeks ago, I couldn't pay more than $15, even for Hendrick's.

klqkauai

Thank you for all your responses. We had dinner with our friends last evening and they returned from Italy less than a week ago. They did confirm that it was for a liter of beer, however, it was not in a hotel bar, just a local establishment. They said it happened on more than one occasion and I have no reason to not believe them but was somewhat shocked. I'm not the beer drinker, but my husband is. I'm looking forward to the wine!

StCirq

Your friends got taken for a ride.

http://www.pintprice.com/region.php?/Italy/USD.htm

nukesafe

It isn't only in Italy that you can get taken for a ride.

Last May we were with friends in Montmartre, and the guy said he was really thirsty and wanted a big beer right now. We were passing through the Place de Tertre at the time, looking at the artists at work. I told him we should walk a few blocks from the square where prices would be more reasonable.

He was thirsty NOW, however, and insisted we sit at an outside table facing the square. He asked the waiter for the "biggest beer they had", and was served a truly ginormous tankard of lager.

When the bill came, the beer cost almost 20 euros! He was shocked, but I was not surprised.

ellenem

Just for clarity, in italy if you sit at a cafe table and order and the waitstaff delivers your beverage--whatever the beverage--the cost will be significantly higher because you are paying for table service.

If you want to keep costs down, order inside at the bar and stand there to drink it. (If you order at the bar, you can't then go sit at a table since you haven't paid table rates.)

On the other hand, for paying these high table rates, the table is yours until YOU decide to leave.

nytraveler

There are plenty of places in NYC with $25 or $30 martinis. You're just not going to the right (trendiest) places - designed for those who are - or want to be thought - to be somebody.

A_Brit_In_Ischia

There's nothing at all odd about paying €13 for a litre of beer - this is last November's list from a very 'sidestreet' bar in Rome...

http://www.pbase.com/isolaverde/image/140853039

... and one taken 2 years ago at a modest place here on Ischia:

http://www.pbase.com/isolaverde/image/131133278

Indeed, do the math with the pintprice site's figure for Rome - at $6.95 per piddly US pint, and 2.1 of those per litre - and it's some $14.27, all but 12 Euro?

Not a huge variation either in (most of) the individual reports behind that figure:

http://www.pintprice.com/city.php?/Rome/Italy/usd.htm

Peter

nukesafe

Thank you for that link to Pint Price, Brit! It's like a Big Mac Index tool for us beer drinkers. Bookmarking that one, for sure.

uhoh_busted

I think we paid about 7euro each for the large Peroni bottle at a sidewalk cafe near the Spanish Steps last September. It was REALLY hot out so we appreciated it. The people watching was superb.

We also noticed prices for any drink at the famous Harry's Bar on via Venito were way up there, but obviously there were many many other places to catch a drink than there

willit

I am fortunate enough to be in Italy as I type. This afternoon, in San Gimignano (Very touristy) on a table outside a tourist café, 1 litre of beer cost ten Euro.
A "Normal" 400ml beer was E5.50.
At the supermarkrt, 660ml of Peroni was 79 cents

annhig

another good reason for renting an apartment!

drink wine outside, beer indoors.