Here we will discuss if restaurants sell ice or not. Many individuals are unaware that restaurants are able to produce ice very easily, since having an ice machine in a restaurant is very common. Their ice machines are usually very expensive, but also very efficient and huge. They are very heavy and serve one purpose, making ice, tons of ice. Restaurants need these ice machines for making ice for the thousands of fountain drinks that they give out daily. It is also used for other working purposes in the restaurant.
Also, the ice machine usually is hooked up to the restaurant’s water supply, meaning that they can make a much ice as they want. This all sounds like good news if you want to buy a cup of ice from a restaurant (or possibly a few bags), but can they actual sell the ice to you? This all depends on certain things, which we will talk about now.
First thing to note is that most of this information applies to fast food restaurants, not dine-in restaurants. Dine-in restaurants operate differently than the fast food restaurants do. They usually don’t have supplies for doing take-out type of orders, unless it is for strict specific types. Most dine-in restaurants will not sell cups of ice or bags of ice, because they just don’t have the appropriate supplies to do it. Restaurants also won’t offer ice to sell separately, because they usually won’t have an appropriate restaurant container to put the ice in to sell to their guests, besides a cup.
Cups of ice.
Restaurants sell cups of ice to their guests all the time. Seldomly the guests will ask for an extra cup of ice to go with their meal, and restaurants will give them one for a very small price. Sometimes restaurants will even give them the cup of ice that they requested for free. Just don’t expect this to happen as if it should be for free. They do also charge for this like they would for water. If anything, you are paying for the cup more than anything else, not the ice itself.
A cup of ice can most likely be obtained in any type of restaraunt that has glasses or cups to put ice in. This also is including dine-in restaurants. An individual can simply sit down to order and request for a glass of ice as a “drink” instead of a cup of water or another type of drink. Because it is only a small request that can be fulfilled with appropriate supplies that the restaurant has, then they should be able to give you a glass of ice.
However, asking for multiple glasses of ice will probably raise suspicions and possibly get disapproved. Restaraunts wash a lot of dishes daily, but they may not want to give their guests more than one glass. They don’t want to wash more dishes than they have to. Also, restaraunts are limited on their dishes sometimes, and must make sure that they have enough glasses for other guests too. Getting more than one glass filled with ice could still work, but it depends on the restaurant and its managers.
Bags of ice.
Trying to get a bag of ice from a restaurant can be difficult to say the least. If you are trying to get a bag of ice from a dine-in restaurant, then you can forget about it majority of the time. Some restaurants might even think that you are silly for asking. Dine-in restaurants will reject selling bags of ice, even though they also have a large ice machine like other restaurants do. Restaurants are expecting people to buy food, not bags of ice, so they aren’t going to have the daily supplies to fulfill this request most of the time.
No matter what type of restaraunt it is, majority of the time this request is rejected. Restaurants are pretty protective about their ice, and don’t even have it registered in their menu screens in their systems to sell as bags of ice. This is because, though their ice machines are large and capable of producing a lot of ice throughout the day, they still aren’t capable of refilling large of amounts of ice that are taken all at once.
All of the ice in their restaurant, including the ice from their fountain drink dispensers, has to be refilled the old fashioned way of waiting for water to freeze and make ice. The ice machines usually refill their supply during the closed hours of the restaurant. This way all the ice is ready to go when the restaurant opens. In fact, sometimes restaurants struggle with their ice machines producing enough ice to fulfill the guests’ orders for the day.
This happens when their ice machines malfunction. Even if they are still producing ice when the ice machine breaks down, sometimes it will produce the ice slower during this process. This can hurt the restaurant’s overall business for the day. Some things a restaurant can tolerate breaking down for a little while without maintenance, but an ice machine isn’t one of them, unless they have two or more. It usually results in immediately calling a company to repair it. In emergencies, restaurants will also take ice from other sister restaurants nearby.
In short, a restaurant’s ice machine might be limited on how much ice it can produce a day for the work load. For this reason, most restaurants don’t sell ice in large quantities to their guests in bags. Even though many restaurants of all types have large expensive ice machines that are capable of mass producing ice, it usually is only capable of producing a little more than enough for the restaurant’s usual amount used in total for the day.
A typical busy restaraunt can go through literal tons of ice a week from just filling their guests’ cups up with ice for their drinks that go with their meals. For this reason majority of restaurants are not willing to go the extra mile to sell bags (or even just a bag) of ice to their guests.
Some fast food restaurants can sell bags of ice that are made from third party companies, or created in other facilities, that won’t cause their ice machines in their restaurant to run low on ice. But your best bet is to check with a convenience store for bags of ice, or even local grocery stores.
