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This is why your local diner and grocery store aren’t open 24 hours anymore

Nov 21, 2024
A variety of businesses, including restaurants and grocery stores, cut back hours amid inflation, changing consumer habits and challenges in finding workers.
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The minimum wage for tipped workers is on the ballot in two states

Oct 21, 2024
In Massachusetts and Arizona, voters will decide if a lower official wage for tipped workers should be phased out or made permanent.
Many restaurant workers rely on tips to raise their pay to state or federal minimums.
Chandan Khanna/AFP via Getty Images

For this fast-food chain, rural Southern towns are the special

Sep 13, 2024
Unlike most fast-food chains, Jack's Family Restaurants has made its mark in a handful of rural regions, boosting public coffers there.
Jack's Family Restaurants has created a large footprint in rural communities.
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Restaurant industry still struggles with staffing, consultant says

Sep 4, 2024
Restaurants across the U.S. have the same problems, says Alexis Percival. "There's been a bit of a reckoning" about how hard the work is.
Alexis Percival, once a restaurant owner, now works as a consultant in the industry. Her current project has brought her to Texas.
Phoebe Landrum Photography

$10.24 for a burrito? Here’s why some restaurants don’t round up.

Jul 24, 2024
While you might expect the cost of a meal to end in "99," some businesses use unusual pricing to ensure they get the profit margins they want.
Some restaurants use specific prices to ensure they're getting the profit margins they want.
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She's a cattle rancher and he loves to cook. Together, they opened a steakhouse.

Jun 17, 2024
The Trasks recently opened JT's Steakhouse, a farm-to-table restaurant in Ely, Nevada.
Terrill and Jess Trask recently opened JT's Steakhouse in Ely, Nevada.
Courtesy Jess and Terrill Trask

All you can eat: The tumultuous history of America’s favorite restaurant deal

Jun 14, 2024
Endless shrimp, endless breadsticks, endless salad bar — they've nearly killed a lot of restaurants. So why do they keep coming back?
Red Lobster has shuttered more than 80 locations and laid off hundreds of workers, but all-you-can-eat shrimp? Still going.
Brandon Bell/Getty Images

For public good, not for profit.

As Red Lobster files for bankruptcy, changing tastes take a toll on its casual-dining competitors

May 20, 2024
The sector hasn't really recovered from the pandemic closures of their dining rooms, when "they lost their core business model."
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Washington, D.C., is a test case for phasing out the tipped minimum wage

Apr 12, 2024
“Now, it is leaner crews,” says one restaurant server, but a more stable income. Other states are watching how it plays out in the capital.
Shortly after the phaseout of the tip credit started in Washington, D.C., last year, employment at sit-down restaurants started to fall sharply, according to state-level data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Eva Marie Uzcategui/AFP via Getty Images

Restaurant hiring affected by warmer weather, lingering pandemic habits

Mar 8, 2024
The number of people employed at restaurants and bars went up 0.3% in February from the month before.
A slowdown in construction work has meant an influx of job applicants for back-of-house positions, says restaurant owner Joshua Pollack.
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