Contemplations on hot dogs and soda

Sports Business Journal has an extended piece about ballpark hot dogs in this week's issue. You can't get to the content unless you're a subscriber, but there are many interesting facts that come of the article. Here are a few of them...

• The traditional hot dog is 8-1. "8-1" is a hot dog lingo term meaning that eight of a particular dog will equal one pound. This is the kind of lingo you need to know.
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• Deluxe hot dogs are usually bumped up to 6-1.
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• Randy Jones Big Slugger dogs are 2-1, which is awesome.
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• The Athletics and the Astros wouldn't disclose how many hot dogs they sell per game. Why exactly is that? What are they trying to hide? What do they stick in their dogs that they don't want people to know about? Soylent Green?
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• SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE, MAN!

There's a breakdown of where your money goes when you buy a hot dog. We're always complaining that they're making a killing on the hot dogs considering the fact that we can go to IKEA or CostCo and get the $3.50 hot dogs for $1. Turns out that for each hot dog, half the cost goes straight to the team. So for a Randy Jones $6.50 dog, the team pulls $3.25 right off the top. Not unlike the mafia.

After that, about 40% goes towards the actual meat, buns and condiments. Another 40% goes to the labor. And finally the last 20% goes to the concessionaire, a.k.a. the suits.

So I guess... considering the mafia-like 50% rake off the top... the hot dogs aren't a total rip-off. Obviously the huge rip-off is in the soda sales. Five bucks for a soda that you can buy for 75 cents. No refills. That's where they're dinging you! I'd like to see a breakdown of how they explain that away.