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Almost everything you spend money on in your restaurant is a cost: the walk-in, the insurance, the rent. A charging point in the car park is rarely one of them — it is an investment that pays money back per guest, and most owners still treat it as a cost, because nobody has ever put the four numbers next to each other.
There are two kinds of chargers, and they are not two versions of the same thing: an AC charger is slow and cheap, a DC fast charger is quick and expensive. The instinct is to pick the fastest one, but a guest who is sitting at a table doesn't need speed — they need time. And time is exactly what an AC charger gives them, and a DC fast charger doesn't.
The EU's AFIR regulation requires a minimum charging capacity along Europe's main transport corridors (the TEN-T network) by 2027. That requirement sits with the network operators along the motorway, not with your restaurant — nothing in it forces your car park to do anything. What it does do is grow the number of electric cars travelling those corridors year after year, and with it the odds that one of them stops at your door to charge instead of to refuel.
Four numbers decide whether that turns into money for your business: what the charger itself costs, how much your country pays back, what a charging guest actually spends at the table, and how many sessions it takes before the charger has paid for itself. Work through your own numbers in the calculator below — everything runs in your own browser, nothing is sent or stored.
The ultimate guide Restaurant Finance: 6 Numbers That Decide Your Profit From investment to grants: everything that keeps your business financially healthy, in one guide. Open the guideThe 4 numbers, in the order they decide the answer
Each number builds on the one before it: the install cost sets what you have to earn back, the grant decides how much of that is left, the dwell time decides which part of the day you capture, and the last number adds the first three together.
1. The installed cost per plug — and why almost nobody needs a fast charger
An AC charger (7 to 22 kW, called "destination charging" because the car stays parked while it charges) typically costs €1,500 to €4,000 installed: the unit itself, the cabling back to your fuse board, and the labour. For most venues the existing electrical connection is more than enough — a 22 kW charger draws less than a large combi oven.
A DC fast charger (50 kW and up) costs €15,000 to €45,000 or more, and most of that is not the charger itself but the grid connection: a fast charger often needs a heavier connection to the network, and that upgrade alone can run into the tens of thousands before the charger has delivered a single kilowatt-hour.
The number hiding underneath this one: a fast charger costs ten to fifteen times as much as a destination charger. That would be fine if it also earned ten times as much back — and that is exactly where the next three numbers fall apart. Almost no restaurant is the right customer for one: a fast charger is built for a traveller who wants to be gone in twenty minutes, and that is not the behaviour that fills a table.
2. The grant share varies by country — and shifts faster than you'd think
There is no EU-wide grant for a charger at your venue; what exists instead is a patchwork of national and regional schemes, each with its own percentage, cap and conditions. France's ADVENIR programme typically covers around a fifth of the supply-and-install cost for non-residential, publicly accessible points, capped at a few hundred euros per plug. The Netherlands' SPRILA scheme goes further for SMEs — up to 40% of the cost — but runs on its own annual application window and a budget that can run out. Germany ran a federal business scheme that covered up to 70% of the cost for years; it has since been discontinued with no announced successor.
That is the pattern worth remembering: some schemes cover a third to half of the install, most cover nothing or have just run out of budget, and none of them is a permanent fixture. Check the current scheme for your own region before you request a quote, not after — an application that arrives too late usually doesn't qualify at all.
Take today's percentage for your own country into the calculator below. At 0% it still works correctly — it simply shows the full install cost.
Two chargers, drawn on the same scale. The pale portion is what the grant covers, the dark portion is what you pay.
On this scale, the install cost of a fast charger is ten times as wide as a destination charger's — that isn't a rounding error, it's the exact ratio between €2,800 and €28,000. The grant percentages are the defaults above and vary hugely by country; swap them in the calculator for what applies to you today.
3. What dwell time actually decides: which part of the day you capture, and who sits down
An AC session runs two to four hours. That is exactly the length of a long lunch, or of an evening at the table while the car keeps charging overnight. The guest has no reason to leave before the plate is empty — they're waiting on the car anyway.
A DC session runs twenty to forty-five minutes. That is exactly one coffee and maybe a sandwich, never a full sit-down meal. The guest stays near the car rather than at a table inside, and leaves the moment the battery is done — whatever is still on the plate.
That gap in time is the real difference between the two chargers, more than the price. A captive guest is not a guaranteed guest: they have to wait, but they don't have to order. So don't model 100% conversion — use a realistic figure instead: over a multi-hour AC session, typically half to two thirds of waiting guests order something at the table; over a short DC stop that share is much lower, because the guest often just stays by the car.
One 24-hour cycle, with the five moments a venue serves guests. The two bars below show how long a car stays at each charger.
2–4 hours — a full dinner, or overnight charging through to breakfast
20–45 min — one coffee, maybe a sandwich, never a full sit-down meal
An AC session overlaps a whole part of the day; a DC session is too short to fit more than one order into. That's why the conversion rates above are so far apart — not because one guest is more generous than the other, but because one has time and the other doesn't.
4. The break-even session count — the first three numbers added up
The formula is simple once the first three numbers are known: net install cost ÷ (margin per session on the resold electricity + average extra spend × conversion rate). That gives the number of sessions you need before the charger has paid for itself — divide by your expected sessions per day and you get the number of months.
With an AC charger, a modest grant, one session a day and half of those guests ordering something, the payback period typically lands around half a year. With a DC fast charger — ten times the install cost, with a much lower conversion rate because the session is so short — that same sum often stretches to two years or more, even with more sessions a day. That is the number behind the opening line of this article: almost nobody needs a fast charger, because it solves a problem most restaurants don't have.
Put your own numbers into the calculator below to see what that means for your venue. The four defaults per charger type are realistic starting points, not a prediction — replace them with what you actually expect.
Run it with your own numbers
Pick the charger type first — the defaults jump to what's realistic for that type automatically. Then overwrite them with your own quote, your own grant percentage and your own expectations.
The calculator shows the number of sessions you need, the payback period in months, and what the charger earns you every month after that.
Will my charger pay for itself?
Pick your type, fill in your own numbers — the rest recalculates as you type.
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An indicative calculation based on your own input. Grant percentages, energy prices and guest behaviour vary hugely by country and by venue — this is a model, not a quote.
Two things to take from this. First: the payback period of an AC charger and a DC fast charger are rarely comparable at the same defaults, and that is exactly the conclusion this article is making — not because one technology is better, but because they are built for different jobs.
Second: change one number and watch what happens. A higher grant shortens the payback period in a straight line; a higher conversion rate does it faster than you'd expect, because it acts directly on the monthly earnings instead of only on the one-off cost.
What to do this week, this month and this quarter
Working out four numbers is step one. This order makes sure you actually use them before you sign a quote.
This week — settle the number
- Fill in the calculator above with your own guest counts, dayparts and expected spend.
- Look up whether your country, region or municipality currently offers a grant for non-residential chargers, and what conditions come with it.
- Ask your grid operator whether your existing connection can carry an AC charger without an upgrade — that alone saves thousands.
This month — compare quotes
- Get at least two quotes for an AC destination charger (7–22 kW), including cabling and installation.
- Submit any grant application before you sign — most schemes reject an application that arrives after the order.
- Decide where the charger physically goes: visible from the dining room, close to the fuse board, and not on your best-selling terrace tables.
This quarter — install, then measure
- Install it and set the resale price of the electricity to a margin you've worked out in advance, not a guess.
- After three months, measure your actual sessions per day and conversion rate, and feed those back into the calculator to see your real payback period.
- Fold the sessions and the extra revenue into your revenue simulator, so the charger becomes part of how you plan your business rather than a line off to the side.
The charger isn't a cost — if you pick the right kind
Almost every owner who runs these numbers finds the same pattern: an AC destination charger pays for itself within a year, often within half a year, because the install cost is low and the dwell time matches a meal almost exactly. A DC fast charger costs ten times as much to install and catches a guest with no time to order — the sum rarely works in its favour for a restaurant.
The AFIR regulation means more electric cars will drive Europe's main corridors in the coming years, not that your venue has to install anything. What it does do is raise the odds that one of those cars stops at your door — and whether that turns into money depends not on the regulation, but on the four numbers above.
Put those four numbers next to your other investments. The financing plan tool and the ROI calculation work the same way: no rule of thumb, just your own numbers against a formula that holds up.