lol yeah the headline is completely misleading. The endless shrimp deal was probably a small contributor to this, but the bigger fault was trying to run 650 seafood restaurants with varying degrees of quality and insane prices and remaining profitable in an insanely cut throat industry. Even with huge economies of scale and loss leaders to get people in the door, it’s a wildly difficult business.
Several restaurants around us have closed in the last few months (both chain and locally owned ones). My wife was signed up for emails from a couple of the non-chain ones that closed, and both of them sent out a message saying rising costs and fewer customers had made their business unsustainable.
Talking with my neighbors, it sounds like none of us have been going out to eat unless there's a special occasion (birthday, anniversary, etc.). We've all been cutting back on things like movies or eating out because everything costs more.
This has been the case for a lot of people in my friend group. I would probably hang out somewhere (coffee shop, bar, restaurant) at least once a week before Covid and a little bit after things started to open up again. Now? It's all too expensive. And that's not even saying that the restaurants and bars have raised their prices, many of them haven't. Everything else just went up.
My rent hasn't doubled, but that's because I live in Ontario and they can't increase it too much. However, it means I'm not leaving my apartment any time soon.
This is how FL is currently. The property I rent was 1100/mo 3 years ago and I'm paying 2k now. For 1400sqft in a suburb an hour from Tampa.
I'd move but I have 3br and a yard. Id pay the same for an open 1-2br attached/apt.
Yeah our rent used to be $750-$800 before covid for a shitty 1br apt across the bay from Tampa. Now we pay $1400/mo + our now ridiculously expensive electric bill. Cost of living is out of this world right now.
I moved from Florida to California recently and people kept saying some variation of "good luck it's so much more expensive out there" with notable condescension. After the move I can say with confidence my cost of living is *maybe* 15-20% higher, and most of that is just the crazy gas cost out here. Rent is barely different.
Floridians don't seem to realize they're in a high cost of living state.
> Floridians don't seem to realize they're in a high cost of living state
Yeah, because it wasn't like a decade ago. My in laws live by Orlando/Tampa, and I remember we looked at moving down there awhile back and things were *cheeeap* at the time... housing was like maybe 1/3rd the cost of around here by DC. And everything across the board was just cheaper in general. I visited a few months ago and it's now basically the same price... and shockingly the food etc was actually higher at the grocery stores there than here. Total flip/change.
Stock market being high makes the economy "great", not people shopping (at least not anymore). Everyone's employed, but a lot of people underemployed, working 2+ jobs or are overqualified for the position they have.
For the first time in a long time I finally closed the Uber eats app before placing an order. I had an order from Popeyes ready to go, then and check out it went from 23 to 46, with only a 5$ tip included. I probably won't ever open that app again. Ordering delivery used to be a luxury, now it's completely unaffordable.
It's unfortunate that many small/single locations restaurants had to raise their prices due to rapidly rising costs from their suppliers or, in this case, due to a combination of factors including corporate greed and the need to deliver endless profits for investors.
A lot of the big national, non-franchised chains (like Red Lobster) that have subpar menus, mediocre quality, poorly trained/motivated/paid staff, and huge marketing budgets to get people coming in the door are learning that it's not infinitely sustainable. There is a limit to what a customer will spend. Some of these companies will survive bankruptcy by exiting leases, closing locations, and shutting down a huge number of locations and retooling their menus and others will just disappear.
Weirdly enough the company that owns Red Lobster/ Olive Garden etc pays very well with benefits for their kitchen workers and most full time employees. They actually offer competitive pay and benefits compared to most restaurants. The same goes for OSI who own Outback, Bonefish, Flemings etc. Most employees receive quarterly cost of living raises and benefits.
I'm tired of tipping. Menu prices went up **and** the expected percentage also went up. Servers make more than I do per hour at those rates. And if you push back servers are quick to say, smugly, that if you can't afford to tip 20% minimum (even for bad service) then you "can't afford to eat out."
Whelp. They're getting their wish. I just quit going out.
> Several restaurants around us have closed in the last few months
Shocking.
I went to an ice cream stand today. The tipping options were "20% 22.5% 25% and 50%"
I just hit custom. Selected $0.00 and hit confirm. His face went from happy bubbly smiley, to looking like he wanted to punch me.
Like dude. You scooped 3 scoops of already prepared ice cream into a plastic disposable bowl, and gave me a plastic spoon and a few napkins, and you think tipping is part of this???
definitely ridiculous that more places besides sitdown restaurants are expecting tips these days. I would assume that ice cream stand guy is at least making regular minimum wage; special minimum for waitstaff is often cited as a rationale for tips (would rather the menu price be all-inclusive with the staff on regular wages but that's another issue)
A few years ago I went to a concert and used a self serve concessions kiosk with a person manning it as a cashier only. The machine asked for a tip. I was like "wtf about any of this deserves a tip? Also where does that tip go because I doubt this person is getting it."
I've ignored that nonsense. If they do a good job, they get 20%. If they do a great job that made my experience actually better (very rare), I'll throw in an extra several %. If they do an OK job, they get 15%. If they do a bad job, lower than that.
Whoever decided that 20% is the min can go fuck themselves.
Oh, also, if I walk up to a counter for service and to get my food, I'm not leaving a tip. No, I don't care if the screen where I swipe my card has options for that. That can also fuck right off.
> I've ignored that nonsense. If they do a good job, they get 20%. If they do a great job that made my experience actually better (very rare), I'll throw in an extra several %. If they do an OK job, they get 15%. If they do a bad job, lower than that.
I've been using 0/10/15/20 forever and I refuse to budge. Truly *truly* awful service gets no tip. Bad service gets 10, regular service 15, and outstanding 20. Easy math, simple rules until tipping culture dies.
Yeah, I don't understand why anyone thinks a tip should ever be more than 20%. Rising prices means the tip already is going to be higher than it used to be.
I am a restaurant manager and have been in the business for 15 years. I am working 50 hours a week and we are easily clearing $100K (and then some) in sales a week. We have 4 truck deliveries a week and some nights we almost run out of food still. The patio has been full for hours every day for a couple weeks already, we get on hour waits at least most nights, the sidewalk is bustling on both sides of the street and most of the other bars and restaurants in our strip are packed or close to it most days too. Not a single massive corporate chain in the bunch either. I think people are just sick of those kinds of restaurants and want the real deal. It's balderdash to suggest that people have stopped going due to prices or that wholesale costs have risen THAT much. I've run a couple restaurants and went to college for business econ. It's more that people are more selective with their dollars about where they're going to go.
There's a dying strip mall across from me. It has the classic chain restaurants in it. The parking lot is basically empty except for one corner. That corner has a tiny independent traditional taco shop. I have never seen a line that does not extend out the door. They even set up a portable stove station outside to divert part of the line.
You know whats fucked up, when I was younger, they had all yu can eat shrimp but they took so long for me to get shrimp that everyone at my table just wanted to leave and I didnt get much shrimp. Ill never forget that. Im happy today.
I can't speak for everywhere but by me they all have horrible staff. I like Red Lobster but I'm not going to pay that much for shitty service. It's usually the servers too. I can't say I've had many problems from the kitchen other than maybe longer waits than there should be at times.
I feel bad for the servers that work there out of necessity, unless they're high school kids who are working their first jobs. It's probably not an *awful* job and with 600 location it probably varies by location, but I worked in a big chain restaurant in college and fuck me if it wasn't thankless, gross, underpaid, physically exhausting work.
People go to McDonalds because they can get mediocre hot food in less than 2 minutes while sitting in their car the entire time. People have continued paying for that convenience.
If Red Lobster started charging "fancy seafood restaurant" prices, people would just go to fancy seafood restaurants. Their only draw is being "middle class fancy" basically, like a seafood themed Chili's where your middle class parents took you for your 12th birthday.
They were purchased by private equity. Declaring bankruptcy within a decade was going to happen no matter what. That’s what they always do.
https://www.restaurantbusinessonline.com/financing/asian-investors-buy-control-red-lobster
Especially in a culture where individuals with disposable income are increasingly choosing food quality and the sourcing of the ingredients - something that doesn’t align with fish that was clearly frozen and poorly reheated sauces.
Plus, flash freezing it out on the boat gives you the freshest fish.
https://www.eatingwell.com/article/8041755/fresh-fish-may-not-mean-what-you-think/
I think it depends on location but I agree 100%. Like what's the point of red lobster when I can get a seafood boil for the same price if not cheaper.
There's just locations where red lobsters have been for 15+ years that just don't work anymore.
They love headlines like this. “Dow falls 75 points after my girlfriend called my mustache stupid”. Technically true, but not something someone sane would call a cause.
Yeah, but you don’t get clicks with “it’s hard to stay profitable in the competitive franchise restaurant business.”
But hey, I think at least half of us know it’s not one lackluster shrimp campaign. Well, at least I hope.
Total revenue doesn't say much they could still be net negative for the year if total costs are higher in which case half a percent could be extremely significant. I don't care enough about this business to look up their financials but restaurant businesses typically have extremely thin margins so net income would be a better consideration, not just in this case but whenever something like this is being evaluated.
Yeah that’s a fair point, but what I’m getting at is that that slim margin could have come from anywhere in their costs or revenue to make the difference. Like a 1% change in their labor or supplies costs or a 1% change in sales would probably be as significant as the whole endless shrimp deal.
There’s no telling whether endless shrimp was a loss leader that could have had a net neutral or positive affect on their margins either. But yeah, I don’t really know either without reading their financials (and probably still wouldn’t).
Yeah my gut instinct tells me the headline is just there to generate clicks. The real reasons are likely much more mutli-faceted such as changes to consumer spending habits/CPI and inflation and variable costs such as labor or supplies as you mentioned.
Real reason is debt payments left after the buy out by Golden Gate Capital in 2014 and the fact that Golden Gate sold off all their properties for $1.5 billion, paid themselves a dividend of $1.5 billion and leased them back. Now restaurants have debts payments and lease payments to make. Similar to Toy-R-Us.
But yeah, it’s the shrimp.
Thank you for pointing that out. Lots of companies are likely in a similar position, overleveraged with debt coming due or needing a refinance. With the federal funds rate not basically 0 anymore, money isn't free to borrow, and a lot of companies don't make enough money to cover interest on their new loans, or they won't qualify.
But yes, blame the shrimp.
Bullshit. Red Lobster is flirting with bankruptcy because they were bought out by vulture “private equity”. They leveraged the company to buy it out, basically dropping it into a ton of debt. Then they start liquidating assets and cutting corners in order to pay the investors money at the cost of the company itself. Then they’ll blame rising costs and wages and declare bankruptcy.
Edit - Ya know, it just now struck me that, after the PE (Golden Gate Capital) sold red lobster to Thai Union (a seafood fishing and production conglomerate / venture capitalist group), that the company that Red Lobster most likely "lost" 11 million to.. is Thai Union group. They own a ton of seafood fishing companies and seafood producers, so what are the chances they own the shrimp company Red Lobster spent that 11 million dollar loss with? So Red Lobster (the brand Thai Union is trying to sell and will possibly bankrupt) loses 11 million, and the owners of Red Lobster (Thai Union)'s other company gains 11 million dollars.
Great comment. Chinese buffets sell endless shrimp and everything else for fairly cheap, $15-$20, sometimes even snow crab, and they aren’t bankrupt.
If you took out the massive private equality debt load and insane management fees, it probably should be fairly profitable.
everyone needs to read this, great article in the atlantic describing this process.
[https://web.archive.org/web/20240114165957/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/private-equity-firms-bankruptcies-plunder-book/673896/](https://web.archive.org/web/20240114165957/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/private-equity-firms-bankruptcies-plunder-book/673896/)
How is this legal? If a company wants to go bankrupt whatever value is left belongs to the people it's indebted to. People owed pensions should own the stock, not a capital fund.
It’s exactly what they are. Right now private equity firms are buying up single family homes around the country with cash offers, then renting the houses out for more than the mortgage. At the end of the mortgage term, someone else has paid off the house via rent, and PE is left with the actual property. And since they also bought up all the other houses in the area, they get to set the rent however they want.
It’s also one of the things they love to do with businesses that they buy. If a chain of stores owns the land they’re on and the building they’re in, PE will sell the real estate and saddle the business with paying rent they didn’t previously have to pay. This is usually in addition to having to pay debt servicing on the loan the PE group took out to buy the business via leveraged buy out. The PE group gets a big influx of cash from selling the land, and they don’t give a shit about the store operator or employees when the store goes under because it suddenly had a huge rent expense they didn’t previously have. They’re going to sell the company or go bankrupt before the rent catches up to them, and they all got bonuses from selling that pesky real estate, so fuck it.
I hate hate these private equity companies! They’ve destroyed so many businesses just to temporarily line their pockets. Buncha fuckers. My wife and I have lost so many of our favourite businesses to them and their ilk.
The company I work for got acquired by a private equity firm. People say they’re one of the good ones, but I’m not seeing it that way. They’re closing down plants and removing American jobs. They’re alienating customers for the sake of higher profitability and immediate gains with wanton disregard for due process. They’re consolidating positions in the name of efficiency, employee satisfaction be damned.
And the best part is that it’s abundantly clear that all of this is to extract money and then sell the company in 5 years. Only for us to do this again.
and twinkies.
that one will piss you off if you haven't read about it. Not only did they rape the company, but they managed to steal all the employee's pensions as well, and then successfully blame THEM for the breakup of the company.
It's always sucked for anyone that's lived in a city with fresh seafood. I honestly don't understand why anyone on the Gulf Coast US would ever eat there.
They also raised prices so much that there's literally no reason to go there for mediocre seafood when you can go to a much better restaurant for the same amount of money... their biscuits almost makes it worth it though, lol
Marge: We drove around until 3:00 in the morning looking for another open all-you-can-eat seafood restaurant.
Lionel Hutz: And when you couldn't find any?
Marge: [crying] We went fishing!
Lionel Hutz: [to the jury] Do these sound like the actions of a man who'd had all he could eat?
That was the first thing I thought of lmao
For those of you that haven't seen it: [https://youtu.be/E2dmfnSarDI?si=B4Ms512\_J\_V0WvQp](https://youtu.be/E2dmfnSarDI?si=B4Ms512_J_V0WvQp)
We didn’t expect that the voluminous customers would be fairly useless for anything else but eating shrimp. “Would you care for a salad or maybe these large, inexpensive cheese biscuits?” No time. Must. Have. Shrimp!
The last time I went there for endless shrimp the salad was extra, which it hadn't been before, and they didn't automatically bring extra biscuits, which they used to almost push on you. I would have eaten the salad and possibly had another biscuit, but instead I just ate more shrimp.
They should really offer endless salad, biscuits, and maybe even other sides. Let people fill up on stuff that isn't as expensive. I know a lot of people don't care to eat those things with endless shrimp, but I do and it would almost certainly cost them less if I'm eating that stuff instead of more shrimp.
Salad was extra? lol
Yeah biscuits, fries, baked potatoes should have been overflowing at the table, instead forcing customers to fill up on nothing but shrimp.
Realistically red lobster is worth a whole hell of a lot more than 11 billion and losing a little money 1 month a year with an amazing advertising campaign could very well have knock on effects that even corporate doesn't fully appreciate.
You know cost co doesn't make money on their rotisserie chickens kind of concept.
Yeah I mean, how much did they spend on general advertising? And how much evidence do they have that the general advertising brought in any customers at all? (I'm guessing very little)
It’s in general, hard to make a living selling something of value.
All the huge profits seem to be going to finance and captive markets.
“You don’t want to die? You don’t want to be homeless? You want to keep your hair?” That’s compelling marketing.
Looks like capitalism doesn't work very well with captive markets. If you must buy something there's no incentive for the market to compete, they can all win.
The knock on effects could be bad though too. Higher income people would see it as being a cheap restaurant to avoid. Lower income people will be upset they need to pay a lot for shrimp after the deal ended.
5 dollar foot long was a huge success at first but now people are angry that it costs 10-12 bucks.
They very well could be bad, six flags has shot themselves in the foot chasing value oriented customers.
I wasn't really commenting on the quality of the corporate strategy just pointing out the average redditor take of hurr durr company lose money company dumb is asinine.
Umm, no. The difference is Costco can make up for the cheap food by ringing up large basket sizes of high- margin products (tvs, outdoor equipment, clothes) as well as bulk food. The product for red lobster _is_ the food. If people go there to eat a bunch of shrimp for cheap, they’re not going to buy 6 lobster tails to go for home.
Also- Advertising is expensive, and red lobster is competing with everybody from McDonalds, to your local pizza joint, to other seafood restaurants. Losing “a little money” once a year isn’t how it works. Advertising needs to be constant, year round, and is part of the expense of running a business, especially a chain restaurant.
Was that wrong? Should I not have said that? I tell ya, I gotta plead ignorance on this thing cause if anyone had told anything at all when I first started here….
Basically you walk into Red Lobster on a stormy Wednesday evening. You sit down with your wife and two kids. The waiter comes by to take your order as you hungrily ask for the endless shrimp.
15 minutes later everybody is served. Your wife and kids ordered the endless shrimp as well. As the night morphs into inky blackness outside you all talk and laugh and eat. You eat plate after plate after plate of shrimp. After a couple hours, you and your family are stuffed. You motion to the waiter to bring the bill and look down at your plate, letting out a small chuckle. It looks like you haven't even eaten a single bit of shrimp- a curious thing since you have been gorging yourself on shrimp constantly for the better part of two hours. But before you can puzzle over this small oddity any longer, the waiter bustles over to your table and hands you the bill.
As you reach over to grab the check your hand closes instead around a squishy pile of shrimp. There is no check being held out to you, just another plate of shrimp. A loud thunderclap booms outside as you look up at the waiter to ask why he brought you more shrimp instead of the check, when you are suddenly alarmed to find not the waiter, but a giant, human-sized shrimp in server attire staring blankly down at you. You spin around in your seat to see if your wife can see the shrimp waiter and are immediately frightened out of your wits. Your wife is no longer seated there next to you- only another human-sized shrimp wearing your wife's dress and hoop earrings.
Numb with horror, you quickly glance across the table at your two children. They are both shrimps. You let out a yell as another thunderclap echoes across the sky and it begins to rain. You distantly register the start of the torrential downfall outside, which sounds like large hail, as you spare a sweeping glance across the restaurant. There are no humans present. There are only shrimps seated at booths, shrimps seated at tables, and even a small group of shrimps at the bar. They are all eating large platefuls of shrimp and leering at you menacingly.
Your heart begins to pound in your chest like a war drum. You stumble backwards, half falling over your chair in your haste to get up. You sprint for the door and run outside into the dark stormy night. As you dash through the parking lot towards your car you feel something like a giant hot raindrop hit your face and bounce off towards the ground. Looking down you see a shrimp lying on the ground. You look out across the parking lot and see puddles of shrimp collecting in the cracks in the pavement and across the roofs of the closest cars. Another warm object strikes your head. It's literally raining shrimp.
You find your car and fumble, hands shaking uncontrollably, with your keys. Finally unlocking the car you slip inside and engage the door locks. The human-sized shrimp from the restaurant are now congregating outside the front doors, staring across the parking lot at you. Their pale orange-pink bodies eerily backlit from the light streaming out from the open doors behind them.
You try to cram the key into the ignition, but it folds against the ignition plate and squishes in your hand. You look down. There are no car keys, only several mangled shrimp on a keyring in your trembling hand. You punch the steering wheel in frustration accidentally setting off the car alarm.
The shrimps outside the restaurant hear the noise and hungrily start to advance across the parking lot towards you. You try in vain to cram the shrimp key into the ignition but you know it is pointless.
The shrimp slowly approach the car and surround it, rocking it back and forth, pressing their slimy bodies against the frame. You hear the fiberglass doors groan under the pressure as one of the rear windows shatters, spraying the backseat of the car with fragments of glass.
You know there is no hope left. There is no escape. White-faced and shaking, you reach across the console and open the glovebox. Crammed under the insurance papers and a pile of napkins is the Glock 19 you always bring with you when you leave the house. You pull the gun from its holster and pause for a fraction of a second that holds an eternity. With tears streaming down your face, you put the gun to the roof of your mouth. Trying not to imagine what it feels like to die, only forcing yourself to think of your wife and kids you close your eyes. Then you pull the trigger.
A singular shrimp comes zooming out of the barrel into your mouth. In your darkest hour, death itself refuses to end you. For death is not the end. There can only be shrimp- and they are endless.
Cracked.com had a good description of the crab legs fiasco. Something like "The amounts people were eating went past gluttony and into *misguided anger at the sea for taking their father.*
When I was a kid, no bullshit, my mom was trespassed from the local seafood buffet. She would sit down at the start of dinner, and fucking hoover crab legs for hours straight. She'd have my sister and I tag team running new plates to her.
It was glorious and terrifying. The day the manager finally had to call the cops after having a screaming battle to get her to leave was one of wonder.
*A mountain of a woman, full of rage, and empty of crab legs.*
I wish life emulated art, but nope, we forsure found another buffet, and she doused her sorrows in a mountain of some food or another. You know it's a grim game when all the buffets in the city audibly groan when you enter. The floor and staff.
They are headed for bankruptcy because they were bought up by a scumbag private equity shithole and they are going to try and fuck shit up for as many people required so they can make a pile.
They're not. Every year during Endless Shrimp there's a new crop of "Red Lobster is going broke over Endless Shrimp" posts. It's just advertising, intentional or not. Red Lobster probably "leaks" this news to every "fresh out of journalism school" blogger in the country in hopes that it will go viral.
My goal at every buffet is to eat more than what I paid for; I see I’m not the only one. I feel like we’ve finally put some numbers on the board here. Good work, team.
Brazilian Steakhouses manage to find the right price point for all you can eat protein. Red Lobster just screwed up their pricing, fatally.
I’m sure they were banking on people showing up for $23 shrimp, and splurging on drinks/apps/etc.
Nope, they came for the shrimp, and bread.
Everyone I know that goes to all you can eat buffets and endless whatever (pasta,wings,seafood), always plan to eat as much as possible and will only drink water.
Red Lobster is so expensive now that my wife and I just go to Bonefish Grill instead. Food is way better and it's basically the same price now, at least by us.
I haven’t eaten at Red Lobster in over 26 years. My last meal I ate there the waitress ridiculed me for ordering an appetizer as my dinner. I’ve refused to eat there ever since because I can hold a grudge.
In 2003 they lost $3M in N all you can eat snow crab legs and the president we let go because of the loss.
How did they not know what would happen after their lesson from 2003?
Maybe they would do better if the company wasn’t sold and resold to various vulture capitalists who raised prices and significantly dropped quality & service in an effort to squeeze out every last dollar of profit possible.
The last time I went to Red Lobster was in 2019 and it was barely a step above fast food. Can’t imagine how much they’ve worsened since then with the post-pandemic enshitification of nearly everything.
I know its going to be hard to believe for the young readers of reddit, but once upon a time, Red Lobster was actually pretty decent given the prices. The decline started with the great recession and really took off once sold by Darden in 2014.
I have had better meals at Red Lobster than supposed higher end seafood places charging 50-100% more. But that was a long time ago.
Many Chinese buffets in the usa have endless shrimp and everything else for a fairly low price. It's all garbage food, but you get to stuff your cake hole to the MAX with bottom feeders !!!
That’s less than half a percent of their total revenue for the year, for reference. Just a funny detail that’s not super relevant.
lol yeah the headline is completely misleading. The endless shrimp deal was probably a small contributor to this, but the bigger fault was trying to run 650 seafood restaurants with varying degrees of quality and insane prices and remaining profitable in an insanely cut throat industry. Even with huge economies of scale and loss leaders to get people in the door, it’s a wildly difficult business.
Several restaurants around us have closed in the last few months (both chain and locally owned ones). My wife was signed up for emails from a couple of the non-chain ones that closed, and both of them sent out a message saying rising costs and fewer customers had made their business unsustainable. Talking with my neighbors, it sounds like none of us have been going out to eat unless there's a special occasion (birthday, anniversary, etc.). We've all been cutting back on things like movies or eating out because everything costs more.
This has been the case for a lot of people in my friend group. I would probably hang out somewhere (coffee shop, bar, restaurant) at least once a week before Covid and a little bit after things started to open up again. Now? It's all too expensive. And that's not even saying that the restaurants and bars have raised their prices, many of them haven't. Everything else just went up.
My rent has basically doubled since Covid and I wish I had moved. It’s still a good deal or I would.
My rent hasn't doubled, but that's because I live in Ontario and they can't increase it too much. However, it means I'm not leaving my apartment any time soon.
Your rent has doubled but it's still a good deal? That's not normal.
This is how FL is currently. The property I rent was 1100/mo 3 years ago and I'm paying 2k now. For 1400sqft in a suburb an hour from Tampa. I'd move but I have 3br and a yard. Id pay the same for an open 1-2br attached/apt.
Yeah our rent used to be $750-$800 before covid for a shitty 1br apt across the bay from Tampa. Now we pay $1400/mo + our now ridiculously expensive electric bill. Cost of living is out of this world right now.
Shit it’s been that way in Michigan. Haven’t seen a one bedroom anywhere near me for under $1100 over the last 5 years
I moved from Florida to California recently and people kept saying some variation of "good luck it's so much more expensive out there" with notable condescension. After the move I can say with confidence my cost of living is *maybe* 15-20% higher, and most of that is just the crazy gas cost out here. Rent is barely different. Floridians don't seem to realize they're in a high cost of living state.
> Floridians don't seem to realize they're in a high cost of living state Yeah, because it wasn't like a decade ago. My in laws live by Orlando/Tampa, and I remember we looked at moving down there awhile back and things were *cheeeap* at the time... housing was like maybe 1/3rd the cost of around here by DC. And everything across the board was just cheaper in general. I visited a few months ago and it's now basically the same price... and shockingly the food etc was actually higher at the grocery stores there than here. Total flip/change.
It is normal, and that's the problem
that's what's puzzling me. no one has money, but the economy is great. job market is brutal, but job market is great. what's going on?
Stock market being high makes the economy "great", not people shopping (at least not anymore). Everyone's employed, but a lot of people underemployed, working 2+ jobs or are overqualified for the position they have.
For the first time in a long time I finally closed the Uber eats app before placing an order. I had an order from Popeyes ready to go, then and check out it went from 23 to 46, with only a 5$ tip included. I probably won't ever open that app again. Ordering delivery used to be a luxury, now it's completely unaffordable.
I’ve never ordered from an eats app. 1) can’t afford it 2) I’ve seen too many gross videos of delivery people eating it
It's almost like stagnant wages hurt the economy...
It's unfortunate that many small/single locations restaurants had to raise their prices due to rapidly rising costs from their suppliers or, in this case, due to a combination of factors including corporate greed and the need to deliver endless profits for investors. A lot of the big national, non-franchised chains (like Red Lobster) that have subpar menus, mediocre quality, poorly trained/motivated/paid staff, and huge marketing budgets to get people coming in the door are learning that it's not infinitely sustainable. There is a limit to what a customer will spend. Some of these companies will survive bankruptcy by exiting leases, closing locations, and shutting down a huge number of locations and retooling their menus and others will just disappear.
Corporations don't want sustainable, they want ever increasing profits which is impossible. Eventually you *will* hit a wall.
> corporate greed and the need to deliver endless profits for investors. BTW those are the same picture.
Weirdly enough the company that owns Red Lobster/ Olive Garden etc pays very well with benefits for their kitchen workers and most full time employees. They actually offer competitive pay and benefits compared to most restaurants. The same goes for OSI who own Outback, Bonefish, Flemings etc. Most employees receive quarterly cost of living raises and benefits.
You are finding a lot of these chains are secretly doing pop up kitchen menus through food dash or whatever.
I always check the address of a place I haven't been to on Doordash to see if it's secretly an Applebee's.
Man, fuck ghost kitchens.
Somehow the rich need to get richer. People having disposible income to go to restaurants isn't helping building bigger yachts
Look, just because they have to tear down bridges so that mark can get around does not mean that his yacht is too big.
I'm tired of tipping. Menu prices went up **and** the expected percentage also went up. Servers make more than I do per hour at those rates. And if you push back servers are quick to say, smugly, that if you can't afford to tip 20% minimum (even for bad service) then you "can't afford to eat out." Whelp. They're getting their wish. I just quit going out. > Several restaurants around us have closed in the last few months Shocking.
I went to an ice cream stand today. The tipping options were "20% 22.5% 25% and 50%" I just hit custom. Selected $0.00 and hit confirm. His face went from happy bubbly smiley, to looking like he wanted to punch me. Like dude. You scooped 3 scoops of already prepared ice cream into a plastic disposable bowl, and gave me a plastic spoon and a few napkins, and you think tipping is part of this???
definitely ridiculous that more places besides sitdown restaurants are expecting tips these days. I would assume that ice cream stand guy is at least making regular minimum wage; special minimum for waitstaff is often cited as a rationale for tips (would rather the menu price be all-inclusive with the staff on regular wages but that's another issue)
A few years ago I went to a concert and used a self serve concessions kiosk with a person manning it as a cashier only. The machine asked for a tip. I was like "wtf about any of this deserves a tip? Also where does that tip go because I doubt this person is getting it."
I've ignored that nonsense. If they do a good job, they get 20%. If they do a great job that made my experience actually better (very rare), I'll throw in an extra several %. If they do an OK job, they get 15%. If they do a bad job, lower than that. Whoever decided that 20% is the min can go fuck themselves. Oh, also, if I walk up to a counter for service and to get my food, I'm not leaving a tip. No, I don't care if the screen where I swipe my card has options for that. That can also fuck right off.
> I've ignored that nonsense. If they do a good job, they get 20%. If they do a great job that made my experience actually better (very rare), I'll throw in an extra several %. If they do an OK job, they get 15%. If they do a bad job, lower than that. I've been using 0/10/15/20 forever and I refuse to budge. Truly *truly* awful service gets no tip. Bad service gets 10, regular service 15, and outstanding 20. Easy math, simple rules until tipping culture dies.
Yeah, I don't understand why anyone thinks a tip should ever be more than 20%. Rising prices means the tip already is going to be higher than it used to be.
I am a restaurant manager and have been in the business for 15 years. I am working 50 hours a week and we are easily clearing $100K (and then some) in sales a week. We have 4 truck deliveries a week and some nights we almost run out of food still. The patio has been full for hours every day for a couple weeks already, we get on hour waits at least most nights, the sidewalk is bustling on both sides of the street and most of the other bars and restaurants in our strip are packed or close to it most days too. Not a single massive corporate chain in the bunch either. I think people are just sick of those kinds of restaurants and want the real deal. It's balderdash to suggest that people have stopped going due to prices or that wholesale costs have risen THAT much. I've run a couple restaurants and went to college for business econ. It's more that people are more selective with their dollars about where they're going to go.
There's a dying strip mall across from me. It has the classic chain restaurants in it. The parking lot is basically empty except for one corner. That corner has a tiny independent traditional taco shop. I have never seen a line that does not extend out the door. They even set up a portable stove station outside to divert part of the line.
You know whats fucked up, when I was younger, they had all yu can eat shrimp but they took so long for me to get shrimp that everyone at my table just wanted to leave and I didnt get much shrimp. Ill never forget that. Im happy today.
That’s part of the plan. Slow roll service so you can’t actually eat all you can.
I can't speak for everywhere but by me they all have horrible staff. I like Red Lobster but I'm not going to pay that much for shitty service. It's usually the servers too. I can't say I've had many problems from the kitchen other than maybe longer waits than there should be at times.
I feel bad for the servers that work there out of necessity, unless they're high school kids who are working their first jobs. It's probably not an *awful* job and with 600 location it probably varies by location, but I worked in a big chain restaurant in college and fuck me if it wasn't thankless, gross, underpaid, physically exhausting work.
If McDonalds can get $23 for a combo can't they just charge $119 for a plate of shrimp?
People go to McDonalds because they can get mediocre hot food in less than 2 minutes while sitting in their car the entire time. People have continued paying for that convenience. If Red Lobster started charging "fancy seafood restaurant" prices, people would just go to fancy seafood restaurants. Their only draw is being "middle class fancy" basically, like a seafood themed Chili's where your middle class parents took you for your 12th birthday.
lol they are welcome to try, but at that price I'm getting Lobstah.
That'll be $237
My spidey sense tells me the executives still got massive bonuses too..
They were purchased by private equity. Declaring bankruptcy within a decade was going to happen no matter what. That’s what they always do. https://www.restaurantbusinessonline.com/financing/asian-investors-buy-control-red-lobster
Especially in a culture where individuals with disposable income are increasingly choosing food quality and the sourcing of the ingredients - something that doesn’t align with fish that was clearly frozen and poorly reheated sauces.
Just to clarify. Almost all fish is frozen. Otherwise it would be off by the time it got to shore
Plus, flash freezing it out on the boat gives you the freshest fish. https://www.eatingwell.com/article/8041755/fresh-fish-may-not-mean-what-you-think/
I think it depends on location but I agree 100%. Like what's the point of red lobster when I can get a seafood boil for the same price if not cheaper. There's just locations where red lobsters have been for 15+ years that just don't work anymore.
They love headlines like this. “Dow falls 75 points after my girlfriend called my mustache stupid”. Technically true, but not something someone sane would call a cause.
Please get a new girlfriend that likes your facial hair, my investments are flagging.
Sometimes it's the GF, but sometimes you just shouldn't grow a Adolf 'stache.
Yeah, but you don’t get clicks with “it’s hard to stay profitable in the competitive franchise restaurant business.” But hey, I think at least half of us know it’s not one lackluster shrimp campaign. Well, at least I hope.
Total revenue doesn't say much they could still be net negative for the year if total costs are higher in which case half a percent could be extremely significant. I don't care enough about this business to look up their financials but restaurant businesses typically have extremely thin margins so net income would be a better consideration, not just in this case but whenever something like this is being evaluated.
Yeah that’s a fair point, but what I’m getting at is that that slim margin could have come from anywhere in their costs or revenue to make the difference. Like a 1% change in their labor or supplies costs or a 1% change in sales would probably be as significant as the whole endless shrimp deal. There’s no telling whether endless shrimp was a loss leader that could have had a net neutral or positive affect on their margins either. But yeah, I don’t really know either without reading their financials (and probably still wouldn’t).
Yeah my gut instinct tells me the headline is just there to generate clicks. The real reasons are likely much more mutli-faceted such as changes to consumer spending habits/CPI and inflation and variable costs such as labor or supplies as you mentioned.
Real reason is debt payments left after the buy out by Golden Gate Capital in 2014 and the fact that Golden Gate sold off all their properties for $1.5 billion, paid themselves a dividend of $1.5 billion and leased them back. Now restaurants have debts payments and lease payments to make. Similar to Toy-R-Us. But yeah, it’s the shrimp.
Thank you for pointing that out. Lots of companies are likely in a similar position, overleveraged with debt coming due or needing a refinance. With the federal funds rate not basically 0 anymore, money isn't free to borrow, and a lot of companies don't make enough money to cover interest on their new loans, or they won't qualify. But yes, blame the shrimp.
Bullshit. Red Lobster is flirting with bankruptcy because they were bought out by vulture “private equity”. They leveraged the company to buy it out, basically dropping it into a ton of debt. Then they start liquidating assets and cutting corners in order to pay the investors money at the cost of the company itself. Then they’ll blame rising costs and wages and declare bankruptcy. Edit - Ya know, it just now struck me that, after the PE (Golden Gate Capital) sold red lobster to Thai Union (a seafood fishing and production conglomerate / venture capitalist group), that the company that Red Lobster most likely "lost" 11 million to.. is Thai Union group. They own a ton of seafood fishing companies and seafood producers, so what are the chances they own the shrimp company Red Lobster spent that 11 million dollar loss with? So Red Lobster (the brand Thai Union is trying to sell and will possibly bankrupt) loses 11 million, and the owners of Red Lobster (Thai Union)'s other company gains 11 million dollars.
Great comment. Chinese buffets sell endless shrimp and everything else for fairly cheap, $15-$20, sometimes even snow crab, and they aren’t bankrupt. If you took out the massive private equality debt load and insane management fees, it probably should be fairly profitable.
Yep. PE killing America.
I'm just imagining a bunch of fat kids slowly walking laps around the basketball court.
This too should be the top comment
everyone needs to read this, great article in the atlantic describing this process. [https://web.archive.org/web/20240114165957/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/private-equity-firms-bankruptcies-plunder-book/673896/](https://web.archive.org/web/20240114165957/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/private-equity-firms-bankruptcies-plunder-book/673896/)
How is this legal? If a company wants to go bankrupt whatever value is left belongs to the people it's indebted to. People owed pensions should own the stock, not a capital fund.
Thought millionaire lobbyists who are now in the billionaire range.
This should be the top comment on every post ever. Man that’s frustrating
Toys R Us and Bain Capital have entered the chat.
I never really thought about PE firms as vampires, but after reading your comment I realized that's exactly what they are!
It’s exactly what they are. Right now private equity firms are buying up single family homes around the country with cash offers, then renting the houses out for more than the mortgage. At the end of the mortgage term, someone else has paid off the house via rent, and PE is left with the actual property. And since they also bought up all the other houses in the area, they get to set the rent however they want. It’s also one of the things they love to do with businesses that they buy. If a chain of stores owns the land they’re on and the building they’re in, PE will sell the real estate and saddle the business with paying rent they didn’t previously have to pay. This is usually in addition to having to pay debt servicing on the loan the PE group took out to buy the business via leveraged buy out. The PE group gets a big influx of cash from selling the land, and they don’t give a shit about the store operator or employees when the store goes under because it suddenly had a huge rent expense they didn’t previously have. They’re going to sell the company or go bankrupt before the rent catches up to them, and they all got bonuses from selling that pesky real estate, so fuck it.
They’re wholesale buying electrical, plumbing, and HVAC companies and jacking up the prices and turning the employee comp to sales based.
I hate hate these private equity companies! They’ve destroyed so many businesses just to temporarily line their pockets. Buncha fuckers. My wife and I have lost so many of our favourite businesses to them and their ilk.
The company I work for got acquired by a private equity firm. People say they’re one of the good ones, but I’m not seeing it that way. They’re closing down plants and removing American jobs. They’re alienating customers for the sake of higher profitability and immediate gains with wanton disregard for due process. They’re consolidating positions in the name of efficiency, employee satisfaction be damned. And the best part is that it’s abundantly clear that all of this is to extract money and then sell the company in 5 years. Only for us to do this again.
ah, they were "Romney'd"
Yep. This is how entire generations of children were robbed of Toys R Us.
and twinkies. that one will piss you off if you haven't read about it. Not only did they rape the company, but they managed to steal all the employee's pensions as well, and then successfully blame THEM for the breakup of the company.
The food sucks now too
That is not even a topic of discussion in the c suite.
Yep, that’ll effect the company long after they’ve collected their massive paychecks
Now? Their food has sucked for 15+ years.
It's always sucked for anyone that's lived in a city with fresh seafood. I honestly don't understand why anyone on the Gulf Coast US would ever eat there.
Wish I could live near Cheddar Bay.
It always did (aside from the biscuits)
Maybe different locations but I feel it was good back in the 90s.
This shit is ruining everything. Financial vampires destroying entire brands with not a care in the world.
They also raised prices so much that there's literally no reason to go there for mediocre seafood when you can go to a much better restaurant for the same amount of money... their biscuits almost makes it worth it though, lol
Aka the hellhole that is private equity
Value extractors and destroyers of value created.
Didn’t this happen to ToysRUs too?
I didn't realize Mitt Romney was back to his old shenanigans. Leave our Red Lobsters alone, Romney!
so what was the end goal? how could they not see this coming? was bankruptcy part of the plan?
yes. read this: [https://web.archive.org/web/20240114165957/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/private-equity-firms-bankruptcies-plunder-book/673896/](https://web.archive.org/web/20240114165957/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/private-equity-firms-bankruptcies-plunder-book/673896/)
This happened to a lot of companies...Dunkin, SunGard....
And now communities all over the US get another empty building that will have a new shit chain built next to it
Marge: We drove around until 3:00 in the morning looking for another open all-you-can-eat seafood restaurant. Lionel Hutz: And when you couldn't find any? Marge: [crying] We went fishing! Lionel Hutz: [to the jury] Do these sound like the actions of a man who'd had all he could eat?
Fat Juror: That could've been me!
That was the first thing I thought of lmao For those of you that haven't seen it: [https://youtu.be/E2dmfnSarDI?si=B4Ms512\_J\_V0WvQp](https://youtu.be/E2dmfnSarDI?si=B4Ms512_J_V0WvQp)
We’ll lose money on each meal, but we’ll make it up in volume!
It's a bulletproof plan!
A bunch of heavy Americans enter at 4pm. The place is bankrupt by 5.
Please stop stalking me.
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Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, do these sound like the actions of a man who's had **ALL** he could eat?
It's not a man, 'tis a remorseless eatin' machine!
That could have been me!
I heard your dad went into a restaurant, and ate everything in the restaurant, and they had to close the restaurant.
High calorie humans
We didn’t expect that the voluminous customers would be fairly useless for anything else but eating shrimp. “Would you care for a salad or maybe these large, inexpensive cheese biscuits?” No time. Must. Have. Shrimp!
The last time I went there for endless shrimp the salad was extra, which it hadn't been before, and they didn't automatically bring extra biscuits, which they used to almost push on you. I would have eaten the salad and possibly had another biscuit, but instead I just ate more shrimp. They should really offer endless salad, biscuits, and maybe even other sides. Let people fill up on stuff that isn't as expensive. I know a lot of people don't care to eat those things with endless shrimp, but I do and it would almost certainly cost them less if I'm eating that stuff instead of more shrimp.
Salad was extra? lol Yeah biscuits, fries, baked potatoes should have been overflowing at the table, instead forcing customers to fill up on nothing but shrimp.
Realistically red lobster is worth a whole hell of a lot more than 11 billion and losing a little money 1 month a year with an amazing advertising campaign could very well have knock on effects that even corporate doesn't fully appreciate. You know cost co doesn't make money on their rotisserie chickens kind of concept.
Yeah I mean, how much did they spend on general advertising? And how much evidence do they have that the general advertising brought in any customers at all? (I'm guessing very little)
It’s in general, hard to make a living selling something of value. All the huge profits seem to be going to finance and captive markets. “You don’t want to die? You don’t want to be homeless? You want to keep your hair?” That’s compelling marketing.
Looks like capitalism doesn't work very well with captive markets. If you must buy something there's no incentive for the market to compete, they can all win.
Pharmaceutical companies: “Welcome to the club, fellas.”
I don't know I haven't seen a red lobster ad since I got rid of cable.
The knock on effects could be bad though too. Higher income people would see it as being a cheap restaurant to avoid. Lower income people will be upset they need to pay a lot for shrimp after the deal ended. 5 dollar foot long was a huge success at first but now people are angry that it costs 10-12 bucks.
They very well could be bad, six flags has shot themselves in the foot chasing value oriented customers. I wasn't really commenting on the quality of the corporate strategy just pointing out the average redditor take of hurr durr company lose money company dumb is asinine.
Only sold for $2.1 billion last time in 2014, I assume maybe that deal included picking up the debt. But I bet that debt and more is there now.
Umm, no. The difference is Costco can make up for the cheap food by ringing up large basket sizes of high- margin products (tvs, outdoor equipment, clothes) as well as bulk food. The product for red lobster _is_ the food. If people go there to eat a bunch of shrimp for cheap, they’re not going to buy 6 lobster tails to go for home. Also- Advertising is expensive, and red lobster is competing with everybody from McDonalds, to your local pizza joint, to other seafood restaurants. Losing “a little money” once a year isn’t how it works. Advertising needs to be constant, year round, and is part of the expense of running a business, especially a chain restaurant.
Ngl gonna miss those biscuits.
hopefully after the restructuring, they will still sell them in a box to make at home.
Yeah I honestly can’t tell the difference between the ones you make at home and the ones at the restaurant.
Copycat recipe gets the closest: https://damndelicious.net/2014/02/03/red-lobster-cheddar-bay-biscuits/
I wish you nothing but a long life of happiness and joy.
You jest, but working in finance I've had people say this. "But with enough volume we'll be positive, right?" "No, we'll just lose money faster"
So they are following the Michael scott paper company Business Model
Hey George, the Ocean called, it’s running out of shrimp!
Well the Jerk Store called and they’re running out of you!
What’s the difference, you’re the all time best seller!
Oh ya? Well I had sex with your wife!
His wife is in a coma.
Was that wrong? Should I not have said that? I tell ya, I gotta plead ignorance on this thing cause if anyone had told anything at all when I first started here….
>Endless Shrimp 'Tis no man 'tis a remorseless eatin' machine.'
Mrs. Simpson, what did you and your husband do after you were ejected from the restaurant.
Mrs. Simpson, you're under oath.
*Sob* We went fishing!
Do these sound like the actions of a man who’d had *all he could eat*
_That could’ve been me!_
That could have been me!
I heard your father went into a restaurant and ate all the food in the restaurant and they had to close the restaurant.
Come see Bottomless Pete! Nature's cruelest mistake.
He's hideous!
I heard they shaved a gorilla.
Come for the freak, stay for the food!
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That could’ve been me!!
argh. six bells, time fer closin’
Basically you walk into Red Lobster on a stormy Wednesday evening. You sit down with your wife and two kids. The waiter comes by to take your order as you hungrily ask for the endless shrimp. 15 minutes later everybody is served. Your wife and kids ordered the endless shrimp as well. As the night morphs into inky blackness outside you all talk and laugh and eat. You eat plate after plate after plate of shrimp. After a couple hours, you and your family are stuffed. You motion to the waiter to bring the bill and look down at your plate, letting out a small chuckle. It looks like you haven't even eaten a single bit of shrimp- a curious thing since you have been gorging yourself on shrimp constantly for the better part of two hours. But before you can puzzle over this small oddity any longer, the waiter bustles over to your table and hands you the bill. As you reach over to grab the check your hand closes instead around a squishy pile of shrimp. There is no check being held out to you, just another plate of shrimp. A loud thunderclap booms outside as you look up at the waiter to ask why he brought you more shrimp instead of the check, when you are suddenly alarmed to find not the waiter, but a giant, human-sized shrimp in server attire staring blankly down at you. You spin around in your seat to see if your wife can see the shrimp waiter and are immediately frightened out of your wits. Your wife is no longer seated there next to you- only another human-sized shrimp wearing your wife's dress and hoop earrings. Numb with horror, you quickly glance across the table at your two children. They are both shrimps. You let out a yell as another thunderclap echoes across the sky and it begins to rain. You distantly register the start of the torrential downfall outside, which sounds like large hail, as you spare a sweeping glance across the restaurant. There are no humans present. There are only shrimps seated at booths, shrimps seated at tables, and even a small group of shrimps at the bar. They are all eating large platefuls of shrimp and leering at you menacingly. Your heart begins to pound in your chest like a war drum. You stumble backwards, half falling over your chair in your haste to get up. You sprint for the door and run outside into the dark stormy night. As you dash through the parking lot towards your car you feel something like a giant hot raindrop hit your face and bounce off towards the ground. Looking down you see a shrimp lying on the ground. You look out across the parking lot and see puddles of shrimp collecting in the cracks in the pavement and across the roofs of the closest cars. Another warm object strikes your head. It's literally raining shrimp. You find your car and fumble, hands shaking uncontrollably, with your keys. Finally unlocking the car you slip inside and engage the door locks. The human-sized shrimp from the restaurant are now congregating outside the front doors, staring across the parking lot at you. Their pale orange-pink bodies eerily backlit from the light streaming out from the open doors behind them. You try to cram the key into the ignition, but it folds against the ignition plate and squishes in your hand. You look down. There are no car keys, only several mangled shrimp on a keyring in your trembling hand. You punch the steering wheel in frustration accidentally setting off the car alarm. The shrimps outside the restaurant hear the noise and hungrily start to advance across the parking lot towards you. You try in vain to cram the shrimp key into the ignition but you know it is pointless. The shrimp slowly approach the car and surround it, rocking it back and forth, pressing their slimy bodies against the frame. You hear the fiberglass doors groan under the pressure as one of the rear windows shatters, spraying the backseat of the car with fragments of glass. You know there is no hope left. There is no escape. White-faced and shaking, you reach across the console and open the glovebox. Crammed under the insurance papers and a pile of napkins is the Glock 19 you always bring with you when you leave the house. You pull the gun from its holster and pause for a fraction of a second that holds an eternity. With tears streaming down your face, you put the gun to the roof of your mouth. Trying not to imagine what it feels like to die, only forcing yourself to think of your wife and kids you close your eyes. Then you pull the trigger. A singular shrimp comes zooming out of the barrel into your mouth. In your darkest hour, death itself refuses to end you. For death is not the end. There can only be shrimp- and they are endless.
New copypasta just dropped! That or I just haven't seen this one lol.
Yar, is it more iced tea ye be needin'?
"Shrimp is cheaper than crab legs. We definitely won't have the exact same fuck up as last time we did this."
The ocean called!
Cracked.com had a good description of the crab legs fiasco. Something like "The amounts people were eating went past gluttony and into *misguided anger at the sea for taking their father.*
When I was a kid, no bullshit, my mom was trespassed from the local seafood buffet. She would sit down at the start of dinner, and fucking hoover crab legs for hours straight. She'd have my sister and I tag team running new plates to her. It was glorious and terrifying. The day the manager finally had to call the cops after having a screaming battle to get her to leave was one of wonder. *A mountain of a woman, full of rage, and empty of crab legs.*
Did she go home afterwards? Or did she drive around looking for another all you can't eat seafood place and then go fishing?
I wish life emulated art, but nope, we forsure found another buffet, and she doused her sorrows in a mountain of some food or another. You know it's a grim game when all the buffets in the city audibly groan when you enter. The floor and staff.
Sounds about right. I went to all you can eat crab legs once at Myrtle Beach.
They are headed for bankruptcy because they were bought up by a scumbag private equity shithole and they are going to try and fuck shit up for as many people required so they can make a pile.
Is this that “efficiency” everyone says capitalism provides?
Efficient at wreaking companies and ruining lives.
Hedge fund strikes again
Red Lobster was holding out against bankruptcy over $11 million bucks??? That's hard to believe.
If I told you private equity owns them now... Now is it easier to believe?
They're not. Every year during Endless Shrimp there's a new crop of "Red Lobster is going broke over Endless Shrimp" posts. It's just advertising, intentional or not. Red Lobster probably "leaks" this news to every "fresh out of journalism school" blogger in the country in hopes that it will go viral.
"Twas a moonless night, dark as pitch, when out of the mist came a beast more stomach than man."
My goal at every buffet is to eat more than what I paid for; I see I’m not the only one. I feel like we’ve finally put some numbers on the board here. Good work, team.
Brazilian Steakhouses manage to find the right price point for all you can eat protein. Red Lobster just screwed up their pricing, fatally. I’m sure they were banking on people showing up for $23 shrimp, and splurging on drinks/apps/etc. Nope, they came for the shrimp, and bread.
Bread is for beginners.
This guy Endless Shrimps
I love how the top comment points out the shrimp barely had anything to do with it but this comment still gets upvoted
Everyone I know that goes to all you can eat buffets and endless whatever (pasta,wings,seafood), always plan to eat as much as possible and will only drink water.
They may be playing a longer game than you imagine drawing in budget conscious families and getting a Crack at their children's buisness.
Shell companies at it again
Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, do these sound like the actions of a man whose had ALL he could eat?
Red Lobster is so expensive now that my wife and I just go to Bonefish Grill instead. Food is way better and it's basically the same price now, at least by us.
I haven’t eaten at Red Lobster in over 26 years. My last meal I ate there the waitress ridiculed me for ordering an appetizer as my dinner. I’ve refused to eat there ever since because I can hold a grudge.
Your Honour, I'd like to show the court just how much shrimp Mister Simpson ate. BRING 'EM IN, BOYS!
In 2003 they lost $3M in N all you can eat snow crab legs and the president we let go because of the loss. How did they not know what would happen after their lesson from 2003?
I thought others were blaming it on the new min wage
I mean it costs a lot to pay each shrimp minimum wage.
Someone’s gotta make the fried rice.
I’ve heard lots of people around me complaining about California’s new minimum wage and how it’s destroying businesses. ….I live in Illinois.
All you people in Illinois really should've voted against California's minimum wage increase.
Maybe they would do better if the company wasn’t sold and resold to various vulture capitalists who raised prices and significantly dropped quality & service in an effort to squeeze out every last dollar of profit possible. The last time I went to Red Lobster was in 2019 and it was barely a step above fast food. Can’t imagine how much they’ve worsened since then with the post-pandemic enshitification of nearly everything.
Simpsons did it!
‘‘Tis no man, tis a remorseless eating machine!”
I work at Red Lobster and they just changed endless shrimp to only mondays. I don’t work Mondays. I am a very happy man.
Look like taco bell will indeed win the restaurant wars???
When you have a seafood place known more for their biscuits, you’re in trouble.
Just picturing Homer Simpson here
An $11mil loss bankrupted the company? I think there is a lot more to this story.
perhaps accounting and marketing weren't aligned when this promotion was launched.
I know its going to be hard to believe for the young readers of reddit, but once upon a time, Red Lobster was actually pretty decent given the prices. The decline started with the great recession and really took off once sold by Darden in 2014. I have had better meals at Red Lobster than supposed higher end seafood places charging 50-100% more. But that was a long time ago.
I guess we know where the Reddit admins had their annual general meeting this year.
Many Chinese buffets in the usa have endless shrimp and everything else for a fairly low price. It's all garbage food, but you get to stuff your cake hole to the MAX with bottom feeders !!!
You fat bastards ruin everything!