I’ve been saying it for almost a 10 years: That the Fast-Casual dining sector would face a brutal shake-out by the middle of this decade. Well, we’re there. And another ‘casual dining’ resto chain is filing for bankruptcy protection…
To be fair, TGI Friday’s hasn’t been doing too well lately, largely because it’s failed to focus on a clear, bold identity that patrons can understand and relate to. But that’s not the story today…
Something different…
The first of a new class of ‘casual dining spots’ when it débuted in 1965, it did well at first. The con-cept was exactly what the time and place called for…
Founder Alan Stillman lived on 63rd. Street between First and York Avenues on Manhattan’s East Side. The neighbourhood was them home to members of the ‘fashionable set’: stewardesses, models, sec-retaries, stock brokers, advertising executives, and other young, single people. The area had plenty of bars and lounges, but no place Stillman felt comfortable.
According to Wikipedia, he wanted to, “recreate the comfortable [private] cocktail party atmosphere in public.” So he opened TGI Friday’s – a play on words popular in that day – as, “a public place for people between, say, twenty-three to thirty-seven years old, to meet.”
Failed to evolve
The chain has been trying all year to pull itself out of a hole it found itself in at the and of 2023. And it’s apparently failed. The problem was diagnosed as a failure of the TIGF concept to evolve with the times.
A news release dated November 2, 2024, explained the chain had been struggling since the COVID lockdown and has never really recovered.
The company has closed down dozens of ‘underperforming locations’ since the start of this year. And announced another ‘flight’ of closures along with its Chapter 11 filing. The closures affect only corpor-ate-owned Friday’s locations., Franchisees will remain more or less unaffected. But they will also be more or less on their own, corporate support-wise.
Meanwhile…
“The Company expects to use the time and legal protections made available through the Chapter 11 restructuring process to allow the Company to explore strategic alternatives in order to ensure the long-term viability of the brand,” the news release explains.
In plain English, that means it’s seeking at the very least a cash infusion to finance a wholesale re-vamp of the brand’s identity and business model. More likely, it will end up finding a holding com-pany which will buy a majority stake in the business. That entity will fix the brand, but end up owning it.
Chapter 11 ‘protection’ basically stops the clock on TGIF’s bills and other liabilities for a certain peri-od of time to let it find its ‘angel’.
My take
I’m thinking the TGIF concept was relevant to some extant right through to the early 2000s. I can see Mad Men fans flocking there, seeking the retro vibe. But the times have changed drastically since the show went into syndication on Netflix. And the ‘Fifties Flash’ fad has passed.
How the TGI Friday’s saga may resolve itself remains a mystery to me – and many other observers, too, I imagine. But I’ll be really curious to see how this particular resto rescue attempt shakes out…
~ Maggie J.