How a Zittau hotel manager is protesting against the tax

Klaus Richter typed the menu. Or perhaps his wife Inge - 40 years ago, neatly typed on the Erika typewriter: the egg drop soup costs 70 pfennigs, the Jägerschnitzel with noodles and tomato sauce 1.90 marks, the pork steak with Letscho 3.30 marks. Farmers' breakfast and Karlsbader Schnitte are of course also available in 1984 in the "Dresdner Hof" in Zittau.

Kathrin Scholz smiles mischievously. The 53-year-old continues to run her parents' traditional house today. Her father Klaus Richter died four years ago. But there are countless memories of him. And there is an archive, which Kathrin Scholz recently tidied up a little on Sundays. As luck would have it, this 40-year-old menu falls into her hands. And the busy landlady immediately has an idea:

"Let's do that now!" she thinks spontaneously. And because she is a woman of quick decisions, she does it immediately: since last Monday, her guests can in the Dresdner Hof restaurant "Scholek" In addition to dishes from the usual menu, you can also taste what the GDR tasted like. Kathrin Scholz invites you to "Traditionswochen à la Klaus Richter".

"Of course, it's supposed to be a bit of fun in these serious and tense times," says Kathrin Scholz. "Nobody would go out to eat today for these simple dishes that were served in restaurants in the GDR." But with her little bit of fun, the restaurateur also wants to to a serious problem in their industry draw attention to this.

"Of course, we can't offer the prices we did back then," she says. But she has calculated with a very sharp pencil, just enough to cover the costs. "No profit, no reserves, no allowances - but no taxes either," explains Kathrin Scholz. "If you don't earn anything, you don't have to pay any taxes."

According to this calculation, the egg drop soup now costs 2.90 euros, the pork steak with seasoned meat - 3.25 marks for her father in GDR times - now costs 11.90 euros. "You can't normally get away with that," says Kathrin Scholz. On a normal restaurant menu, she would offer such a steak with spiced meat for at least 17 euros. That's why she deliberately only chose dishes for her traditional weeks that are not on her normal menu. "I don't want to push down the price level, which is such a burden on all of us in the restaurant industry right now."

The burden has increased noticeably since the beginning of the year. Since January, restaurateurs have once again had to pay 19% of their income to the state as VAT. During the coronavirus pandemic, the tax rate was reduced to seven percent to help the industry survive. However, Kathrin Scholz confirms that during this time, costs in the hospitality industry have become so expensive that prices in restaurants have continued to rise.

"What annoys me most is that we were assured from the outset that VAT would remain at seven percent permanently - and are now backing out," says Kathrin Scholz. Her namesake, the Federal Chancellor himself, had promised this: "We will never abolish it again," said Olaf Scholz (SPD) during the 2021 election campaign.

The rising costs for raw materials, energy and staff have long since eaten up the benefit of the lower VAT. The ox cheeks and lamb fillet in the "Scholek" already cost 26 euros last year. Kathrin Scholz doesn't like to think about how she struggled to break the 20 euro barrier on her menu for the first time.

"That's such an inhibition threshold," she says. But there's no other way to do it in the restaurant business. That's why fillet of beef is no longer even on her regular menu, at most sporadically when the meat is on offer somewhere - and then for 32 euros.

Kathrin Scholz has not yet raised prices in the restaurant since the turn of the year. "We want to see if we can manage like this first," she says. "We're trying to save money wherever we can." The chocolate bar on the bill, for example, has been removed. There are now more vegetarian and vegan dishes on the menu, which are cheaper than fish and meat. Instead of relying on the delivery service, the Scholz family now go shopping themselves and consciously look for special offers.

"We'll see how long that lasts," says Kathrin Scholz, who remains optimistic despite everything. She also wants to hold her "Traditionswochen" in the "Scholek" until the end of March. Even if they don't generate any income for the business. The whole family business - her husband, her sons, her long-time employees - goes along with it.

The response to her campaign has already been great after the first few days. "It's not bad that we're becoming better known now," smiles the hotel manager. She has even been approached by people from Zittau who didn't even know about it before, that the "Scholek" in the Dresdner Hof is a public restaurant - daily from 4 to 10 pm.