ATLANTA — From a five-star hotel to the Atlanta Zoo, we tracked down the vendors that businesses at Atlanta’s airport used to set their prices.
In Atlanta, there is a limit set by city law on how much vendors are allowed to charge you.
The policy is called “Street pricing plus 15 percent.” It means businesses cannot charge more than a 15% higher price than at a comparable location outside the airport.
In a Channel 2 Action News investigation earlier this month, Channel 2 Consumer Investigator Justin Gray put it to the test. He went concourse by concourse at Atlanta’s airport checking prices of items and then comparing them to prices at locations close by.
What we found were big price hikes for everything from coffee to pizza to medication.
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Now, after waiting more than a month and half, we have received data from an open records request showing where some of the businesses used to set those prices were.
A Hartsfield-Jackson spokesperson tells us, “The concessionaire selects 3–6 comps from a designated perimeter, including ‘same or similar’ concepts for proprietary and like-for-like for branded concepts.”
Then those businesses submit their proposed prices where “the selected comps are then reviewed and either approved or denied.”
Gray went to some of the businesses listed as comparisons and found prices that did not match what the vendors claimed and the airport approved.
For example, Areas USA used the CVS at 520 Boulevard SE in Grant Park for comparison prices for a long list of medical supplies at its airport convenience stores.
But the prices we spot checked were lower than what Areas submitted.
The 50 count Ibuprofen Areas submitted as $7.99, was $6.99 when we checked.
Bacitracin ointment and Lidocaine wound gel were both also $1 less than what was reported to the airport to set the comparison price.
One airport Starbucks location compared to Starbucks stores inside Lenox Square mall in Buckhead.
When Gray checked prices there, he found all 3 drinks we checked, the double espresso the latte and the plain coffee used for comparison were each priced less than what they were reported as.
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Actual Lenox price was $3.15 for the double espresso versus the $3.65 we found from our open records request, $5.15 compared to $5.75 for a grande latte and $3.15 compared to $3.45 for a basic grande drip coffee.
Another Starbucks location run by a different operator did use accurate prices for comparison for the Howell Mill and Little Five Points locations.
But the price that location was approved to charge was not what they actually charged us at the airport.
We were charged $4.55 for a grande medium roast. The price that Starbucks was approved to charge was more than a dollar less than that, $3.39.
Travel blogger Gary Leff writes Viewfromthewing.com.
“The real issue is where merchants aren’t compliant with the rules that they have agreed to as part of their contract and where local airport authorities may not be enforcing those agreements,” Leff said.
The airport pricing policy is a city ordinance. In 2021, city council increased the amount businesses can charge from 10% to 15% because of rising costs and the increased challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Coca-Cola vending used prices from the Atlanta Zoo, the Georgia World Congress Center and Georgia International Convention Center to set soda prices.
A company that runs several bar and grills in the Airport used the bar prices at one of Atlanta’s most exclusive hotels, the Four Seasons in midtown as one of its alcohol comps along with other high-end bars like the Ticonderoga Club.
“The question of what is comparable is always an ambiguous or amorphous kind of idea,” said travel blogger Gary Leff.
But it is airport officials who ultimately have control and responsibility for the prices.
A third-party contractor engaged by the airport verifies street pricing before approval and the airport spokesperson says, “Any pricing that exceeds the street plus 15 percent model is denied.”
A Starbucks spokesperson said, “Depending on the market, pricing varies. There are many factors that contribute to pricing decisions, including various rising operating and occupancy expenses (i.e. labor, rent, local mandates and regulations, competition, distribution, marketing, and commodities — including coffee — but also other commodities associated with beverages, food, materials, and operations.)”
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