Burrito in Boulder

4 restaurants in Boulder list burrito on their menus. The cheapest is Foolish Craig's Cafe at $12.00, listed as Chorizo Burrito. The typical price across town is $16.50, and the dearest we found is $17.95 at Rio Grande, so the two ends of the list are $5.95 apart, which is 50% more for the same dish. Of the 4 kitchens listed, 1 charges more than a dollar under the typical price, 2 sit within a dollar of it and 1 charges more than a dollar over.

We track burrito in 104 other areas and compare them all on burrito across United States. The typical price there runs $13.00 at the median, so Boulder is dearer than most of them, with a lower typical price than 10 of the 104. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $4.15 at La Fiesta in Springfield, IL, and the highest best price is $16.63 in Santa Monica, CA. The nearest area with it is Westminster, about 15 mi away, where the best price is $5.00.

Where is the cheapest burrito in Boulder? Foolish Craig's Cafe, at $12.00 on 1611 Pearl Street. The same dish reaches $17.95 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $5.95.

What should burrito cost here? About $16.50 is the typical price across the 4 kitchens in Boulder that list it. Of the ones listed above, 1 is more than a dollar below that and 1 is more than a dollar above, so the typical price is a middle rather than a floor.

Is it cheaper nearby? The nearest area we track it in is Westminster, about 15 mi away, where the best price is $5.00. That is $7.00 less than the best here, though whether that is worth the journey is your call.

Why do the prices differ so much? We compare what each menu calls the same dish, and menus are not identical: portion, cut, sides and the kind of room you are sitting in all ride on the price, and none of that shows up in a number. Part portions and half sizes are kept out of this comparison, and a chain charging the same at several addresses is counted once, so the spread above is between genuinely different kitchens rather than the same one repeated.