In this Weekly Wrap, we’re looking at customers dining our earlier, employment gains in the industry, one existential threat to restaurants according to David Chang, and more.
Consumer Dining Trends
The Headline: “Consumers are still dining out, with some caveats”
The Source: Restaurant Business Online
What You Need to Know:
Customers are dining out earlier, in every sense of the word. Reservations for both breakfast and early-bird dinners are on the rise, according to Toast.
Bookings for 9 a.m. rose 19% last quarter, the biggest increase for any time slot, followed by 10 a.m., up 15%. That was tied with the 4 p.m. slot, which also saw a 15% increase in reservations.
Late-night reservations, meanwhile, saw a slight dip: Reservations for 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. dropped by 1%.
Resy reported a similar shift, noting that more people dined at 4 p.m. than 9 p.m. this year. In surveys, consumers said they’re willing to eat earlier to beat the dinner rush and because they want time to relax after dinner. Or, in some cases, they want to leave room for a second dinner: A shocking 40% of Gen Zers told Resy they’ve had a two-dinner night. (That’s one way to build traffic.)
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Consumers increasingly view going out to eat as an activity above and beyond their normal routine. According to OpenTable, 61% of Americans said dining out next year will feel more like a “special treat” than a regular habit.
Naturally, this shift is going to have an impact on where people choose to dine. Customers are continuing to look for restaurants that offer an experience rather than just a meal.
On OpenTable, there was a 46% increase in “experiential” dining year over year, and 37% of consumers said they’d like to see more of that in 2026. This could include pop-ups, collaborations or “special experiences,” all of which would entice 48% of customers to dine at a restaurant, OpenTable found.
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A striking 77% of Gen Zers and 79% of millennials told OpenTable that they consider a restaurant’s “Instagram/TikTok-worthiness” when deciding whether to eat there. Overall, 58% of consumers feel that’s an important aspect of a restaurant.
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Perhaps the most encouraging figure was that 55% of consumers expect to spend more on dining out next year, with a planned 10 visits per month, according to OpenTable.
It wasn’t clear whether that means they’d like to visit more expensive restaurants, or just splurge a little wherever they go. Either way, it suggests consumers are feeling more hopeful about their finances going into the new year.
Our Take:
These are numbers and studies that small operators need to take to heart. While there are great takeaways, there are still some questions. The big one for me is why diners are eating out earlier. In big cities, the pandemic definitely changed the dynamic of when people ate, and the residual effect of this is most likely still in place, but part of the reason could be the deals that tend to occur at those early hours. Pretty much every article and study shows that guests are looking for value, and one time period that is synonymous with value is happy hour.
Focusing on profitable yet exciting items during this timeframe can help operators drive business. On the flip side, how do we drive guests in during those slower later periods? It could be a late-night happy hour or some of the “special experiences” that consumers are craving. A special experience at 9 p.m. makes way more sense to drive business than doing a similar experience at primetime.
The TikTok/Instagrammable experience is something I wish would just go away. Unfortunately, for the time being, it is here to stay, and as operators we need to be aware of it and develop and style the presentations of our food, drinks, and venues accordingly.
September Jobs Report
The Headline: “September marked industry’s strongest employment gain in months”
The Source: Nation’s Restaurant News
What You Need to Know:
The Bureau of Labor Statistics released its September jobs report Thursday morning, which included a stronger-than-expected 119,000 positions added during the month. That said, unemployment rose to 4.4%, from 4.3% in August.
Employment in food services and drinking places continued to trend up in September, adding nearly 37,000 positions. This follows the August report in which eating and drinking establishments added 11,000 roles.
Notably, September marked the strongest employment gain for the industry in six months, according to the National Restaurant Association, and the second-largest gain this year.
In total, restaurants added nearly 68,000 jobs in the third quarter, as the July and August readings were revised higher. That was a marked improvement from the first (-28,000) and second (+23,800) quarters of the year.
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Employee counts at quick-service and fast-casual restaurants were 107,000 jobs (or 2.4%) above pre-pandemic levels, while full-service levels remain down by 3.7%, or about 212,000 jobs, since that timeframe.
This report comes on the heels of third quarter earnings results showing a broad slowdown in consumer spending and traffic across most of the industry, with some executives warning that they expect this trend to continue into the first part of 2026.
Our Take:
There have been a lot of negatives in the news lately and this is positive, though when you break down the numbers it is only optimistic for some sectors. QSR and fast casual are picking up and have caught up to pre-pandemic numbers, while full service levels are still down.
Part of this is that restaurateurs I have spoken to have cut back staffing both BOH and FOH and have had employees assume the responsibilities of other roles within the restaurant that they may have cut. For example, servers acting as hosts in the absence of having one.
Overall the jobs report is good news, but as these numbers are from September, we don’t yet know the impact on jobs the government shutdown had in October into November. Our outlook could change drastically with the job numbers in the coming months.
The Restaurant Industry’s Existential Threat, According to David Chang
The Headline: “One of Gen Z's habits is an 'existential threat' to restaurants, says Michelin-starred chef David Chang”
The Source: Business Insider
What You Need to Know:
Momofuku founder David Chang says America's youth isn't drinking alcohol in the same way as earlier generations, and it has become the "real existential threat" to the restaurant industry.
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Gen Z not getting drunk is a problem for restaurants, he said, where the sales ratio is generally about 70% food to 30% beverages. "Something is going to give when you are down 18% on beverage sales," he said, citing average sales numbers across the restaurant industry.
According to a Gallup survey from August, the percentage of young adults — Gen Z and some millennials — who say they are drinking alcohol fell by 9% between 2023 and 2025.
Our Take:
Gen Z not getting drunk is not an existential threat. It is a call to action and not the type of action you think. The call is not to get more young people to drink more alcohol. It is to find ways to thrive within the changing dining habits; it’s to adapt or survive. It is not the end. It is a new beginning.
One need only to look at the Dirty Soda movement which started among the Mormon community in Utah. The fact that the movement is spreading outside the needs and confines of the religion’s abstinence from alcohol shows that people still want to drink. They just do not always want to drink alcohol as much. And the trend of zebra striping, having non alcoholic drinks between alcoholic drinks, reinforces this.
Does it change the way we operate and project? Yes. Is it the end of days for restaurants? No. It’s not as if there are no countries across the world where alcohol is illegal. Countries that have flourishing food scenes. Yes, there are societal and legal norms in some of these places that make it easier to operate and be successful. But it still shows that sit down restaurants can survive without booze or at least with less reliance on it.
The restaurant world is not ending. It is just changing. Like everything.
Addiction Support In the Industry
The Headline: “Bar Staff Are on the Front Lines of the Opioid Epidemic. But Who Is There to Support Them?”
The Source: Punch
What You Need to Know:
Substance dependency has impacts on both sides of the bar. The hospitality industry has long been associated with drug use, but over the past 30 years, that reality has been underscored by the opioid epidemic. In 2023, more than 200 people in the U.S. died per day due to an opioid overdose, though that was the first year where opioid deaths decreased since 2018. A significant amount of those gains were due to expanded telehealth access for opioid treatments, such as methadone, which helped people in recovery stay on their medicine and avoid relapse. However, many of those gains rolled back in September, due to a lack of Congressional approval and the government shutdown.
Over the past 30 years, Daliah Heller, the vice president of overdose prevention initiatives at Vital Strategies, a global health organization, says that it’s become clear that industries that require physical exertion have higher opioid use than others.
Bartending, for example, requires long hours and physical labor. When workers in this industry sustain an injury, there is pressure to push through it and continue working, leading some to self-medicate. High-pressure situations are commonplace, and finding ways to cope with them becomes paramount. According to a 2015 report by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the hospitality industry has the highest rates of substance abuse disorder, and the third-highest rates for heavy alcohol consumption. Because heavy substance and alcohol use is so normalized in the industry, those with addiction may find it hard to seriously talk about it.
The structure of the industry, too, can be a barrier. According to December 2024 data from the Independent Restaurant Coalition, only about 32 percent of food service employees have access to employer-sponsored health care compared to 77 percent of workers across the private sector. The threshold for Medicaid eligibility shifts from state to state. Alex Jump, the director of operations at Focus on Health, a harm reduction training organization based in Denver, says that restaurant workers earning $21,600 annually, or about $1,800 per month, do not qualify for Medicaid in Colorado.
Our Take:
This hits hard. I have been working in this industry for 35 years, from my early teens to adulthood, and addiction and mental health have always been the soft unspoken underbelly of the industry. It has only been in the past few years that we as an industry have started to say the quiet part out loud and discuss the truth. I don’t have a blanket solution. There is not one. But as time goes on, the industry is attempting to make strides.
Some organizations focus on addiction support like Ben’s Friends and Restaurant Recovery, while others, like The Burnt Chef Project, Another Round Another Rally, Yes Chef! Behind the Apron, provide awareness and support for both addiction and mental health.
It is important we keep talking about addiction and mental health issues within the industry. The problems are not going anywhere, but if we keep pushing awareness to the forefront for operators and their teams, we can make strides that lead to real and impactful change.