How Texas Roadhouse's Cocktails Help Keep Its Prices Low

Out of all the steakhouse chains in America, Texas Roadhouse has some of the lowest prices available. Even the best steaks on Texas Roadhouse's menu are available at a reasonable price, thanks to some pricing strategies employed by the chain. Certain items help tack on additional costs, creating a bigger final bill and keeping steak prices low at the same time.

Cocktails are one of the easiest ways to lure customers into buying more. Texas Roadhouse keeps its cocktails at relatively low prices, typically at around $10 or less. This sounds cheap, and by itself it would be, but combined with a $10 steak and maybe an appetizer or two, an $8 cocktail quickly becomes part of a $20 or higher bill.

This is just one part of how Texas Roadhouse keeps its steaks so affordable. As long as the chain can keep the pricing down, they can keep luring customers in. As long as customers keep coming in, then they can keep pushing additional items with higher profit margins like cocktails onto customers, thus increasing overall sales every time.

Cocktails are just one of many ways that Texas Roadhouse tries to get customers to add on items. Appetizers are another big way the company manages to make more money and keep steak prices down at the same time. Even little steak add-ons, like mushrooms and onions, contribute.

Employees are highly encouraged to push these add-ons to customers. Former employees mentioned on Reddit that management would get upset with them if they didn't push customers hard enough to buy add-ons. Some even said that management would write up reports or have discussions with employees that didn't manage to get enough add-ons purchased by customers.

Overall, it's a combination of having the additional items available and maintaining low steak prices that makes Texas Roadhouse money. Having employees push customers to purchase them is just part of the strategy: Low prices bring customers in, and piling on extra purchases keeps the bill high and the steak prices low so customers keep coming back.