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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?
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Wednesday May 31 2017, @04:14AM (3 children)
I'm not sure what this has to do with "immigrants." If lunch restaurants were feasible businesses to run in small-town America "downtown" areas, immigrants would likely be the ones running them, as they have for generations. Your Jewish deli, your Irish pub, the German sausage/hot dog cart, the Italian pizza joint, even the quick Chinese "lunch special" with eggroll were all common destinations for workers looking for a quick bite for lunch. In fact, one could argue that pizza became popular in the U.S. partly because it was a cheap lunch food that poorer workers could enjoy quickly.
Blue collar workers couldn't afford a sit-down meal for lunch -- they had neither the money nor the time for it. So immigrant restaurants often filled in the gap by providing cheaper high-calorie eats to hungry workers.
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Wednesday May 31 2017, @04:18AM (2 children)
I forgot to say that the reason for the decline in such restaurants is a combination of fewer people having "walkable" jobs in small towns, the growth of fast food chains (which often can drive lunch prices down even further and cater to those who are willing to drive a short distance; you don't even need to get out of your car), and the trends noted in the present article for fewer people taking the time for eating lunch out.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Wednesday May 31 2017, @05:37AM (1 child)
I'm going to go with the #1 reason is the decline of living wage jobs, followed up by the #2 being dickhead executives that don't want to even give 10 minutes for somebody to eat. Eat on your own time is their refrain.
Time may be a factor, but not for me. It's about 10 minutes round trip for me to access at least 6-7 different restaurants on foot, and 10 minutes round trip in the car is not all that much farther and gives me about 5 time as many options. Getting there quickly and back not a problem. Even more confusing is my understanding of downtown where I live. It's just lousy with all kinds of restaurants, and simply teeming with businesses and business parks within walking distance of each other. At least where I am access and transportation is not a problem. Don't mind spending the time on myself to get away. When I was younger and more hardcore...yeah.. still spent the time to get away in restaurants. Those were the good days before Great Depression II: The Fuckening.
Most stuff is at the table within 10-15 minutes of ordering, and that's stuff that takes awhile. I can get a good meal and back to the office in less than an hour without being rushed, or being in a car. I can cut it down to 15 minutes and be back at my desk to eat if get takeout someplace and order ahead of time. Which brings up delivery, and that is also from restaurants, so their downturn is including delivery orders which eliminate at least 1/3rd of the lunch hour. There are quite a few delivery options available at different levels of service. A lot of is already Internet "enabled" with app support, websites, and portals like eat24.com and well serviced as far as tech goes now.
The consumer debt bubble is probably going to go any minute, and I'm betting, that another factor is that Americans have tapped out their credit lines too much in addition to the lack of living wage jobs pretty much anywhere.
I'm lucky if I eat lunch out 4-5 times a month. That is just to keep me from going crazy from eating cheap salads all the time. Only thing holding me back from eating out every single work day? MONEY. Those 4-5 meals cost me almost $100 once you factor in taxes, tips, and fucking glasses of iced tea that need to cost as much as a pack of cigarettes.
If you tried to eat out everyday at prices in my area it would approach rental prices, and those are above the slave wages already. It used to be no more than 30% if income to living expenses, and now it is over 100% for my entire county. For us it is literally the choice between eating in restaurants or sleeping in a bed at night. That means figuring out how to live on a food budget from the early 2000's in today's economy.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 1) by AssCork on Thursday June 01 2017, @12:34PM
At this point we're up to a whopping eighty-seven cents. Factor in the things like glassware, time, etc, to prepare and serve a single beverage, and you're still no where near the three dollars it costs me a the local sit-down family-friendly lunching establishment.
The same $3.00 at my local grocer nets me a gallon of ice tea.
$3.00 for (maybe) $1.00 at cost. That's a steep mark-up for a restaurant that doesn't have a stage and a few poles.
Just popped-out of a tight spot. Came out mostly clean, too.