A HALSTEAD fish and chip shop has been forced to up its menu prices due to cost-of-living increase.

The Hook first opened in Halstead’s town centre almost a decade ago and was listed as one of the top fish and chip shops in the country in the 2023 Fry Awards.

The shop has always been very popular, but since the cost-of-living increase, shop owner, Alex Garcia has noticed a decrease in customers.

He said: “Since Covid we’ve had to gradually up our prices, not as much as we should’ve percentage wise.

“Energy bills have gone up massively, shopping has gone up, wages have gone up, and that’s affected the price of fish and chips."

The shop has seen regular customers visiting less and changes in customer orders due to the increased menu prices.

“Customers that would come three times a week might only come once a week," Alex said.

“Maybe their food choices have changed – where they’d have got a large cod and chips maybe now, they’re getting sausage and chips.

“At the moment we’re not planning to change the pricing, but it all depends on the government."

He continued: “We try to give good value for money, we take our customers into consideration when we increase the prices,

“Customers are always on our minds and we’ll only increase the prices if we absolutely have to."