First it was the hefty price of a ticket, then booking a seat on oversubscribed flights, then the ordeal of finding an affordable hotel. But football fans travelling to Brazil for the World Cup can expect their budgets to be stretched even further on arrival when they are met with over-inflated prices on everyday items that could see them paying up to £20 for a pizza.
However, it's not just visitors to Brazil being stung by unexpected price hikes. One Brazilian graphic designer, Pedro Almeida, grew so frustrated with price inflation in his home town of Rio that he decided to create an app to help consumers keep track of it.
Ju$to, which launched in March, lets users search for the item they want – such as the cost of a meal – and then compare the best prices at nearby businesses. The prices are crowdsourced and dated, so you can see if the cost has gone up since the last person visited, leaving you the option to haggle or find a cheaper option.
"Just like London, we are having a housing bubble," said Almeida, who originally developed the app for locals, before realising how it could benefit tourists. "And that's putting a lot of pressure on prices across the board, especially food and services. During the World Cup, tourists will be coming here in droves and definitely won't be able to navigate where to go, or where to eat because of the language barrier. The price surge this year is bigger than in previous years."
Almeida was inspired by other consumer awareness campaigns such as Rio $urreal, which called on residents of Rio to expose and boycott the "extortionate prices being charged by bars, restaurants and shops", even producing a mock banknote with Salvador Dalí's face on the front.
"For the three years I've been living in my neighbourhood, Leblon, I've seen prices go up 40-50% on average," said Almeida. "There is a lot of awareness around the subject, and a few consumer movements to try and get people to steer clear of places abusing this."
Currently the app – which is free to download – is most useful in Rio, where the majority of its 7,000 users are based, however Almeida hopes that as it spreads, it will become a useful tool for any World Cup fans eager to avoid handing over £10 for a beer.
