Goby fish is scarce, the price has increased 3 times, the restaurant can’t buy it, must accept to leave customers

Mr. Quoc, the owner of Can Tho fish and goby hotpot restaurant, Quoc Cham in Tan Mai (Hoang Mai, Hanoi), scarce coal and goby fish forced him to refuse a large number of customers from online ordering applications. daily.

“Customers placed orders online continuously, but we had no goods to sell, so we had to apologize and inform them that there was only enough quantity of goods to serve customers coming to eat on the spot, not enough for takeaway. Currently, although we regret it, we are forced to shut down the application, waiting for the supply to increase again.”Mr. Quoc said.

According to Mr. Quoc, his shop can still import goby from farms, but the supply is very limited. Along with that, the price of gasoline increased, transportation costs also increased, causing the price of goby fish to increase many times compared to nearly 2 months ago. Previously, the price of imported goby fish was only about 150,000 – 170,000 VND/kg but now it is 450,000 – 500,000 VND/kg, 3 times more expensive.

“Now who has goby fish to sell to me, I also import as long as I have goods to sell to customers, but if I wait this long, I will lose all customers.”

The price of goby increased, forcing Mr. Quoc to increase the price of goby hotpot. Knowing that raising prices would lose customers, but he had no other choice.

Similarly, Mr. Tran Huy Trung, owner of 3 Hoan Chau goby hotpot restaurants in Hanoi, confirmed that the scarcity of goby fish makes his business many times more difficult than before. Although he did not increase the selling price, instead, Mr. Trung’s restaurant had to reduce the amount of goby fish in each hot pot to balance the new price.

“Customers order goby hotpot, we always tell customers that a pot of hotpot still costs VND 350,000 but there are only 8 goby fish instead of 16-17 as before because the price of goby fish is too high, anyone who agrees, eat, if not, we advise to eat another dish”, he said.

Mr. Trung said that overtime, customers who come to the restaurant to eat goby hotpot can only eat one part (8 goby fish), but call more restaurants and do not sell. “In the past, when customers ate goby fish hotpot, we also encouraged customers to order more fish, but now we ask customers not to order more because there is nothing to sell.“.

“Fortunately, our restaurant sells many other dishes, but if we only sell goby hotpot, we may have to close. Because of all 3 restaurants, but I can only import 5kg of goby fish every day, I don’t understand how to sell them.”Mr. Trung was bored.

According to some owners of goby restaurants, the scarcity of this specialty will have to last for another 3-4 months, when the rafts reach the point of harvest, the supply of goby fish will return to the market. normal.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Dung, a resident of Hoang Van Thai (Thanh Xuan, Hanoi) said that during her 6 years of trading in goby, this is the first time she has witnessed such a sharp increase in the price of goby.

“Not only increased prices 3 times, but also could not import goods to sell. I’m a longtime trader myself, but I also have to wait a few days to receive a small batch of goods“, said Ms. Dung.

According to Ms. Dung, the situation of goby fish is scarce, the price increase is due to the prolonged effects of the COVID-19 epidemic, the number of farmed rafts is shrinking, and people are less likely to enter the breed, making the supply to the market scarce. Currently, active economy society has returned to normal, if from now on farmers start to breed, it will take 3-4 months to have goby fish sold on the market.

“Until then, the general price level will stabilize again, but with the current scarcity of supply, the price of goby fish will be difficult to cool down.”Ms. Dung said.