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Cheeseburgers are seen in a pile during a burger-eating contest for National Cheeseburger Day at P. Terry\u2019s Burger Stand on Lamar Blvd in Austin, Thursday, Sept. 18, 2025.<\/p>\n
Mikala Compton\/Austin American-Statesman<\/p>\n
No matter how much you love\u00a0Lorde <\/a>or Charli XCX<\/a>,\u00a0Austin City Limits Music Festival<\/a> will eventually break your soul. You buy a round of drinks and you’re down $100. Canned water<\/a> is $6.<\/p>\n Your partner wants to leave early. You are now arguing in front of strangers.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n And that\u2019s when P. Terry\u2019s \u2014 the venerated local burger stand, as if you didn\u2019t already know \u2014 shines a light in the dark. P. Terry\u2019s has returned to ACL Fest for the first time in nine years, selling burgers that are comparatively cheap.<\/p>\n The\u00a0worker-owned<\/a>, charitable<\/a>, secret menu-offering<\/a>, 24-hour<\/a> burger stand is selling $5 hamburgers, $6 cheeseburgers, $7 veggie burgers, and $4 French fries at ACL.<\/p>\n ‘We have a responsibility to our customers.’<\/p>\n P. Terry himself \u2014 that\u2019s founder and CEO Patrick Terry \u2014 was on-site at Zilker Park Friday.\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re pretty in tune with our customers, and in our 21 years of selling burgers, \u00a0people are hurting like never before. The price of everything is too high. I\u2019ve never had so many comments about our low prices than I have over the last four days at this festival,\u201d P. Terry’s owner Patrick Terry told the Statesman Saturday.<\/p>\n \u201cShout out to PT for being the only vendor that did not f\u2014 over my wallet at ACL. I love you,\u201d\u00a0a Reddit user wrote on Friday.<\/a> His post subsequently received 376 upvotes on the social media site.<\/p>\n \u201cThank you for not gouging a bunch of kids trying to have fun. Keep them in mind when you aren’t at ACL and looking for a burger,\u201d another added.<\/p>\n Festgoers take a break to eat near the ACL Eats food court at Austin City Limits Music Festival on Friday, Oct. 9, 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n Ricardo B. Brazziell\/American-Statesman<\/p>\n \u201cI think we have a responsibility to our customers to never take advantage of them under any circumstances,\u201d Terry said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n P. Terry\u2019s prices are up at the festival compared with its standard menu. Burgers are normally $3.10 and cheeseburgers $3.65. The veggie burger is $4.85. But the stand remains the cheapest option in the food court.\u00a0<\/p>\n The flip side to the streamlined, affordable menu is that the P. Terry\u2019s line was so long you\u2019d think\u00a0Sienna Spiro<\/a> was at the front of it signing records. At 4 p.m. Friday, festgoers could walk right up to most stands in the ACL Eats food court, but not P. Terry\u2019s. The line for $5 burgers stretched back to the dining tent and looped around.<\/p>\n The burger stand was founded by married University of Texas alums in 2005. According to the\u00a0Moneywise podcast<\/a>, P. Terry\u2019s makes between $150 $200 million annually.<\/p>\n Why is food so expensive at ACL?<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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