You’re having bottomless mimosas at brunch, and you’re about to reach for your sixth glass of sweet bubbly mixed with freshly squeezed OJ.
A good idea? Maybe not, as these San Francisco Bay Area restaurants have implemented a vomit cleanup fee for patrons who overindulge.
Kitchen Story, an Asian-fusion brunch establishment in Oakland, will charge a $50 cleaning fee to customers who don’t make it to the toilet. A sign posted in the bathroom states the restaurant’s policy of charging those who toss their brunch in “public areas.” The restaurant instituted the measure during the pandemic.
“It was really tough cleaning,” co-owner Chaiporn Kitsadaviseksak told SFGate, and he said the job made workers even more uneasy due to COVID-19. “People were scared … and this was happening a lot. My workers don’t want to do that.”
But the situtation improved, he said. “Now [customers] know they have to pay. They understand.”
“Dear all mimosa lovers, please drink responsibly and know your limits,” reads a photo of the sign posted on Yelp.
These kinds of policies are certainly not new. Kitchen Story’s general manager suggested implementing it after noticing similar signs in bars, co-owner Steven Choi told SFGate.
On New Year’s Eve in 2021, a restaurant bar in Toronto put up a sign announcing a $50 fee for guests who vomited inside. The owner told the publication BlogTo they started the policy in 2019 and hadn’t had any such unpleasant incidents since.
Uber and Lyft charge riders from $25 to $150 in cleaning fees for puking incidents, according to a driver writing on Harry Campbell’s the Rideshare Guy website. This driver said that in a single year he made over $1,100 in cleaning fees.
Another brunch establishment in San Francisco, Home Plate, also put up signs instituting a $50 cleaning fee in late 2021. When customers complained, the warning was relocated to the bottom of the drink menu.
Owner Teerut Boon told SFGate they still got someone throwing up “every other week” — but outside. Home Plate has also gone from a two-hour time limit to 75 minutes for bottomless brunch to prevent customers from drinking as much.
This story originally appeared on LA Times
