LA Times: U.S. restaurants starved for business

[marmar]

With consumers and businesses keeping a lid on expenses, more and more small and mid-size restaurants are throwing in their dish towels and closing up shop.

Southern California lost nearly a thousand more restaurants than it gained during the 12 months that ended in March, representing a net 2% drop that was twice the national average, according to the New York research firm NPD Group.

Nearly all the closings were among independently owned restaurants: small, family businesses that just couldn't hold on as customers held back. Earlier in the year restaurants reported modest increases in business, but the jumps in sales were too little too late for many.

"We were going in reverse," said Ken Rausch, who last month made the wrenching decision to close his family's 65-year-old San Gabriel Valley restaurant, Edward's Steakhouse. The restaurant had weathered previous recessions, but this downturn drained the family's resources — and showed few signs of letting up, Rausch said.

Other well-known haunts have also succumbed: Orso on 3rd Street near Robertson Boulevard, a trattoria popular with the entertainment crowd, closed last winter after a nearby movie studio laid off a big chunk of its employees; across the nation, Koo Koo Roo, Bennigan's, Bakers Square, Tony Roma's and other chains have shut dozens of locations. .........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-0821-restaurants-closing-20100821,0,584097.story

[frazzled]

1. The chains you mention

were probably as much victims of changing tastes in American eating as victims of the recession: Bennigan's, Baker's Square, Tony Roma's. These are older chains with none too healthy or fresh menus. People just don't want to eat pie and ribs as much anymore. There are many more interesting and appetizing restaurants in the same price ranges.

What I've noticed where I live is that the quality restaurants (whether upscale or modest) that serve creative, healthy, and non-institutional foods are pretty packed still. The others, not so much. People have changed their eating habits and, given tighter budgets, are more exacting when they do eat out.

[old mark]

2. We eat restaurant food maybe one-two times a month, but almost never at chains...

we are fortunate to live near many very good individually owned restaurants and those are who we patronize and support.

Face it, food at most chains are not that good to begin with, and certainly not inexpensive, so we find no reason to eat there, other than occasional nostalgia - we had lunch at a Taco Bell last spring because we had not been to one in at least 5 years...have not been back since.


mark

[david13]

3. Chains, no chains. There has been no question that the restaurants

are down, as they always are in difficult economic times. It's one of the first things people can cut out. The restaurant. Supermarket instead. Or a loaf of bread and sandwich meat.
I certainly have noticed fewer numbers almost everywhere for the last few years, coinciding with the economic downturn.
And the resultant closure of some of the hardest hit places.
dc