The price of food and dining out rose once again in September. According to the latest Consumer Price Index data, food prices rose 2.3% from a year ago, while the cost of dining out rose 3.9%.

Brian Will, Will Restaurants Investment Group founder and CEO, joins Morning Brief to discuss how inflation is weighing both consumers and restaurants.

"It's been a dramatic shift from what we call pre-COVID to post-COVID. Now, whether that's political or whether it was just the economy, we have seen prices jump astronomically in the last three years. Everything from rent and utilities to maintenance to food costs to labor costs. Everything is just skyrocketing. And it's driven our wholesale costs up to the point where we can only raise our prices so much before people stop coming in," Will tells Yahoo Finance.

He notes that Will Restaurants, along with many other restaurants, have increased their prices over the last two years. However, revenues continue to drop despite the price increases.

"We've unfortunately, in my opinion, have come to a point in the pricing scheme where we can't raise them much more. You know, we jokingly say that our bacon, lettuce, tomato sandwich now is $16. That's expensive for a bacon, lettuce, tomato sandwich. But when you figure all the costs in, we don't make that much profit on that $16 because we have so much overhead that has to get covered. So I think the economy is going to have to catch up with us a little bit before we're going to be able to do any more price increases," he adds.

While dealing with higher operating costs and the volatility of food prices, many restaurants have implemented staff cuts in an effort to keep their balance sheets in check.

Will adds that meats have become the most costly ingredient for his business, noting that ground beef, chicken, and fish are among the most expensive in the category. He also explains that the price of cheese has also increased.

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This post was written by Melanie Riehl