Pizza in New Orleans

15 restaurants in New Orleans list pizza on their menus. The cheapest is One More Pie at $9.00, listed as Build Your Own Pizza. The typical price across town is $13.99, and the dearest we found is $17.95 at Fresco Cafe & Pizzeria, so the two ends of the list are $8.95 apart, which is 99% more for the same dish. Of the 15 kitchens listed, 5 charge more than a dollar under the typical price, 5 sit within a dollar of it and 5 charge more than a dollar over.

We track pizza in 1058 other areas and compare them all on pizza across United States. The typical price there runs $13.95 at the median, so New Orleans is dearer than most of them, with a lower typical price than 471 of the 1058. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $4.49 at Bellacino's Pizza & Grinders in Troy, MI, and the highest best price is $18.00 in Tacoma, WA. The nearest area with it is Metairie, about 12 mi away, where the best price is $7.99.

Where is the cheapest pizza in New Orleans? One More Pie, at $9.00 on 1101 Decatur St. The same dish reaches $17.95 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $8.95.

What should pizza cost here? About $13.99 is the typical price across the 15 kitchens in New Orleans that list it. Of the ones listed above, 5 are more than a dollar below that and 5 are 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 Metairie, about 12 mi away, where the best price is $7.99. That is $1.01 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.