# Using pre-algebra to find the price of soup

#### Corgi218

##### New member
I can not solve this problem for the life of me!

A group of friends went out for lunch.
Four
people ordered soup. Four
people ordered sandwiches. Each sandwich costs twice as much as a bowl of soup. Four
people ordered burgers. Each burger costs three times as much as a bowl of soup. The total cost for their lunch was less than $59.04 What was the price of a bowl of soup? Last edited by a moderator: #### tkhunny ##### Moderator Staff member I can not solve this problem for the life of me! A group of friends went out for lunch. Four people ordered soup. Four people ordered sandwiches. Each sandwich costs twice as much as a bowl of soup. Four people ordered burgers. Each burger costs three times as much as a bowl of soup. The total cost for their lunch was less than$59.04
What was the price of a bowl of soup?

Rule #1 - If you don't know what it is, name it something so you can talk about it.

S = Price of one (1) Bowl of Soup
B = Price of one (1) Burger, then B = 3*S
W = Price of one (1) Sandwich, then W = 2*S

Rule #2 - Problem Statements must be specified very clearly.

I think there were 4 people.
I think all four ordered soup.
I'm not clear on how many ordered a sandwich.
I'm not clear on how many ordered a burger.
I would seem odd to order both a burger and a sandwich.
The words "less than" can problematic.

Can you provide a complete and informative problem statement?
Can you show any of your own work as it might give us a clue?

Rule #3 - If the problem statement cannot be clarified exactly, there may be multiple solutions.

Rule #4 - Don't memorize a useless set of rules.

Last edited:

#### Subhotosh Khan

##### Super Moderator
Staff member
I can not solve this problem for the life of me!

A group of friends went out for lunch.

Four people ordered soup.

Four people ordered sandwiches. Each sandwich costs twice as much as a bowl of soup.

Four people ordered burgers. Each burger costs three times as much as a bowl of soup.

The total cost for their lunch was less than
\$59.04

What was the price of a bowl of soup?

Assume the price of one bowl of soup was = S

Four people ordered soup. → Cost of soup = 4*S

Each Sandwich costs 2 times as much as a bowl of soup. → the price of one Sandwich was = 2*S

Four people ordered . Sandwich (assume each ordered only one Sandwich ) → Cost of burger = 8*S

Each burger costs three times as much as a bowl of soup. → the price of one burger was = 3*S

Four people ordered . burgers (assume each ordered only one burger) → Cost of burger = 12*S

Assuming that the above was "complete" order 

Then

4*S + 8*S + 12*S < 59.04

S < (59.04/24) < 2.46

Exact price of bowl of soup cannot be calculated because the last condition is given as "inequality".

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#### Denis

##### Senior Member
The total cost for their lunch was less than 59.04.
What was the price of a bowl of soup?
Not enough info. Like, soup could possibly sell for 1 cent !
Total cost = 24 cents.

I see no reason for your drunken teacher not to simply state:
total cost was 59.04 !

#### Jomo

##### Elite Member
Not enough info. Like, soup could possibly sell for 1 cent !
Total cost = 24 cents.

I see no reason for your drunken teacher not to simply state:
total cost was 59.04 !
I tried to educate many many math education majors over the years and trust me they are not drunks but rather incompetent. In fact, next to business majors, the math ed majors were my weakest students. Very sad and scary.