In my last Restaurant Rant I took Applebee’s to task for attempting to pass off something I would not feed to my dog(I ultimately did) as nachos. Today I take Chili’s to task.
I am not domesticated. About 80 percent of my meals come from one restaurant or another. I am also a creature of habit. I tend to frequent the same establishments in streaks. I therefore am in a good position to notice food and service trends at those particular establishments.
Quick Casual restaurants are being hit hard in this economic crisis. Patronage is down. Food costs are up. Profit margins are razor thin. Something has to give. Many restaurants are taking the unfortunate but logical step of reducing portion size and increasing price. I have no problem with this as along as quality does not suffer. It is a survival mode environment. Something has to give to stay in business. Where do we draw the line as consumers? Do desperate economic times entitle restaurants to employ desperate measures to survive. By desperate measures I am not referring to serving guacamole without lettuce or putting one tomato slice on a burger instead of two. I am referring to substituting cheaper and ultimately inferior food products. I am referring to storing food products longer and ultimately serving them past the time they would normally do so. Mind you I am not referring to illegal activity. I am referring to that piece of chicken or burger patty that is thawed and put into circulation a week or two past what is normal SOP. Would you be able to tell the difference? Would you care? I view this as the equivalent of a restaurant “bait and switch”.
Case in point is my recent trip to Chili’s. I happen to like Chili’s. My girlfriend and I eat there on a regular basis. On this last trip I ordered a Chicken Ranch Sandwich as well as two scoops of guacamole and chips for an appetizer. The guacamole came in a container about as big as a thumbnail. When I questioned how such a tiny container could contain two scoops it looked smaller because they stopped garnishing with lettuce due to cost. This was two scoops? You judge for yourself. When the food arrived, I realized they had brought me the Cajun Chicken sandwich. No big deal, it looked good so I stuck with it. When I bit into it there was a strong and familiar taste that any bachelor would recognize. That freezer taste that occurs from a product being stored frozen too long before use. It appeared that in addition to the wrong sandwich they added some freezer burn to boot. It could have been an isolated occurrence. Dallas based Brinker International, one of the nation’s largest casual dining companies, owns Chilis. Brinker is facing hard times like everyone else. They recently announced restaurant closings and layoffs. It has also announced losses of 21.8 million, or 21 cents a share, in the quarter that ended Dec. 24, compared with a year-ago gain of $54.5 million, or 52 cents. It makes perfect sense that they would look for each and every way to save money including subtle strategies such as every so slightly increasing the length of food storage before use with the hope that customers will not notice the change. I have some news for Chili’s and other restaurants that may be employing or thinking of employing this strategy. It is noticeable! You may win the battle in the short-term as you save costs but you will lose the war as you drive loyal customers away for good.
*This blog represents my personal opinion only. I have no objective evidence that Chili’s is serving food after a longer hold time or substituting inferior products.
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March 5th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
I agree. As a connoisseur of food and good service, allow me to recommend Pappasitos and Pappadeux.
Grew up on Chili's but they sold out a long time ago when they went to plastic mugs over glass and demolished the very first Chili's off Greenville Ave. Clearly as a patron we know where their heart is.
March 5th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
Chili's is very hit or miss by my house in Baton Rouge. Some days good, but more often than not, it's pretty bad. The thing to remember is that it's a chain restaurant and it always seems that their food quality/service lacks compared to a locally owned restaurant.
March 5th, 2009 at 4:01 pm
It is a tough call when margins get thin isn’t it? You also have to have pride in your work – or what are you contributing to? Your own restaurant’s demise perhaps.
March 5th, 2009 at 9:29 pm
I am a manager for a casual dining restaurant. We have taken the opposite approach. We have made sure that all of our products are fresh and grade A. Because of higher costs, we had to decide, do we increase prices or reduce portions? We decided to reduce portions. For example.. a Hamburger steak used to be 8 oz, now it's 7.5no one has complained, and our sales have increased 13% over last year. People pay for quality not quantity.
March 6th, 2009 at 12:16 am
That freezer burn thing is inexcusable. The skimping is understandable, but going overboard will undoubtedly turn customers off. I termed this "The Subway Effect" about 5 years ago. You are free to use the term, but please cite it by saying "A wise man once termed it . . ."
March 6th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
Brian, I was at the Natl Grocers Assoc meeting in Las Vegas last month. Quick Serve Restaurants were poised to overtake "eating in" 51:49 in dollar volume last year. It was derailed at the last moment due to downturn. People pulled in their QSR appetites. As a result the QSR business is down 8%. In ONE quarter! Think that doesn't have an adverse impact on their entire supply chain and how they adjust in the kitchen/back-office? It definitely does.
April 26th, 2009 at 8:32 pm
Chili's used to be a favorite for our family of five. Though we often ordered the same things, we occasional added to our list of favorites. In past year our list has been getting shorter and shorter as Chili's takes our favorites off the menu. Our last (and I do mean last) visit to Chili's was so disappointing, as we all struggled to find something we still liked on the menu. Starting with the appetizers, the only item that had a decent amount of meat was the boneless shanghai wings, gone… mozzarella sticks, gone…. without those options, there was no point in getting our usual Triple Play appetizer. Guess they went the way of our long lost favorite dessert, the High & Mighty Pie Ice Cream Pie. When our meals came, we joked about who's was the worst. I believe I won with my was flavorless Margarita Grilled Chicken (chicken?). It had the most unusual texture, not meat like at all. It's hard to describe the flavor, mostly because there was none, but as we passed it around best descriptions were, a very firm tofu with grill marks and a cheap frozen dinner. My son's Country Fried Steak, was the second worst with lots of fired batter and very little meat. The only good part of our outing was the joking around about how bad the food was, although that ended when the bill came. Not that it was terrible expensive but for five to-go boxes of dog food it was a bit much. On way out our three sons were talking about what to get us for Christmas. Why you may ask were they talking about Christmas in April. For the past 6 or so years, they've given my husband and I, movie tickets and a gift certificate to Chili's. It's always been a nice date night for us and a no-brainer for the kids. Chili's and the movie theater are in the same parking lot. Always finding something to laugh about, we decided that Chili's is the new lump of coal. We'll know we were on Santa's naughty list is we get a Chili's gift certificate again this year. Luckily we have eight months to make sure that doesn't happen.