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posted by n1 on Tuesday May 30 2017, @10:45PM   Printer-friendly
from the instant-noodles dept.

The U.S. restaurant industry is in a funk. Blame it on lunch.

Americans made 433 million fewer trips to restaurants at lunchtime last year, resulting in roughly $3.2 billion in lost business for restaurants, according to market-research firm NPD Group Inc. It was the lowest level of lunch traffic in at least four decades.

While that loss in traffic is a 2% decline from 2015, it is a significant one-year drop for an industry that has traditionally relied on lunch and has had little or no growth for a decade.

"I put [restaurant] lunch right up there with fax machines and pay phones," said Jim Parks, a 55-year-old sales director who used to dine out for lunch nearly every day but found in recent years that he no longer had room for it in his schedule.

Like Mr. Parks, many U.S. workers now see stealing away for an hour at the neighborhood diner in the middle of the day as a luxury. Even the classic "power lunch" is falling out of favor among power brokers.

Re-heating leftovers in the break room microwave takes two minutes and is guaranteed to be on your diet?


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  • (Score: 2) by Snotnose on Wednesday May 31 2017, @12:47AM (1 child)

    by Snotnose (1623) on Wednesday May 31 2017, @12:47AM (#518008)

    They make tasty food at cheaper than competitive prices. I can spend 2 minutes walking to it, opposed to 10-15 minutes driving. I get tasty food some 10% cheaper than wherever I go. I don't have to spend 10 minutes with co-workers deciding on where we go. And I'm not expected to tip.

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  • (Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday May 31 2017, @02:15AM

    by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Wednesday May 31 2017, @02:15AM (#518039) Homepage Journal

    My coworker Matt Ackeret refuses to believe that fresh squeeze tastes better than reconstituted orange juice. I used to have a cup of fresh squeeze every single day.

    Google has even better cafeterias, and they don't have cash registers, in an effort to keep employees on campus. (I've interviewed there.)

    I don't really want to work for google but the food there is one reason I might be convinced.

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    Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]