Restaurant in China charges customers based on attractiveness

© Imaginechina/Corbis

The Zhengzhou restaurant for 'goodlooking'

A restaurant in central China is offering free meals to its most attractive clients.

The Jeju Island restaurant, a Korean eatery in the Chinese city of Zhengzhou, says the 50 most handsome people to arrive at its gates each day will be spared paying their bills.

Those hoping for a free lunch have their looks evaluated by a panel of local plastic surgeons whose tummy-tucking talents the restaurant is attempting to promote.

Before eating guests are taken to a "beauty identification area" where they are photographed and considered. Potential diners are judged on the quality of their faces, eyes, noses and mouths. Protruding foreheads are a particular advantage, according to reports.

As news of the promotion spread, Chinese internet users debated how they might fare at the restaurant.

"I reckon I can get a one per cent discount with my face," joked one user of Weibo, the social media site.

"Do the ugly have to pay twice?" wondered another.

The restaurant's owners appear to be more concerned with physical appearance than English language skills. "Free meal for Goodlooking," read a bright pink sign that was hung outside the eatery last Saturday to advertise the newly launched promotion.

© Corbis

A customer uses a face-scanning machine at the restaurant

Authorities in Zhengzhou were unimpressed, accusing the initiative of damaging the city's image and claiming the garish sign did not have official permission.

On Tuesday teams of security guards and demolition workers descended on the restaurant to remove the sign, China News Service reported.

Xue Hexin, the restaurant manager, vowed that the free meals for the beautiful would not be stopped.

"We will be more prudent with our advertising in future," she said. "But the promotion will continue despite the demolition of our sign."

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