I would much rather go to a local restaurant any day of the week. Italian restaurants where the food is made from scratch, nice portions, family owned…there’s nothing like it!
This thread began with stores you hate or love…frankly I feel bad that everything is a chain now. The US is slowly taking back manufacturing and producing American Made products again…when that really takes off maybe we’ll be able to see individual unique clothing stores and any kind of product stores opening up again. And not the same old chains everywhere you travel in this country. {Boring}
If “you finally found one you REALLY like” then odds are pretty good that it failed because of competition with chain restaurants. Local restaurants rarely dominate the scene, and restaurants that are failing for quality reasons rarely have anyone REALLY like them!
Life changed when they closed the local Spaghetti Factory. That must have been 15 years ago, when the home company pulled in the reins.
What I really loved was the mesquite grilled seafood places in CA. We’re in a great food city and even hole in the wall breakfast places are great- but we also love IHOP.
About Walmart and Target: when they arrived, we persisted in shopping only at the local stores or regional chains. That lasted four years, didn’t even set foot inside a WM. Alas, one by one, most of those local chain equivalents disappeared (except a few local grocery chains and specialty hardware places. There’s huge loyalty here for those.) It was part management and continuing to do things as they always had. But we still talk of them- in that New England way: “where XXX used to be.”
Yea, in HI, directions are often given as where the Old Police Dept or Sears used to be. It can be very tough if you have no idea where the nonexistent stores or places were and no addresses. We spent 30+ minutes trying to meet dad for lunch when he gave no lcurrent landmarks, no current name other than a long street that is literally miles long with no cross street reference. Argh!
162 - landlord can pull the rug from under a new business, neighbors start complaints about smells, health department makes some demands, cost of food skyrockets, etc. Sure, the owners can sue in some of the situations, but you probably know that restaurants are not usually high-profit margin businesses and the owners do not have a ton of spare cash to take care of some of these issues. Some of these issues have nothing to do with the quality of food or competition...
LOL about Applebee’s. Personally, if I’m going to pay any money to eat out, it better be a dire necessity (I’m traveling and nothing better available!) or it is something that would cost me way more to fix myself, like sushi. Pasta and steak - I can make my own just fine.
Yes, many of our fav local restaurants closed when landlords doubled the lease rent and the profit margins were too slim to allow those higher rents. Still miss those places!
Not all smaller restaurants make from scratch, btw. Nothing like seeing the big cans in the back. Taco Bell corporate used to be a client and at that time, all the produce was ordered nightly, delivered in the wee hours. No idea, now. it was probably coming from someplace like Sysco, anyway. A few years ago, in the Atlantic, there was an interesting comparison of Walmart and some specialty places, on produce quality- may have included WF and some regional names, I forget. Depending on the WM store (not ours) and how much it stocks fresh foods, it seems Walmart made a local (ish) buying effort and rated well. Who knows?
Outside of big cities, landlords are a pretty rare problem (even though there is a lot of complaining and/or publicity when it happens), in my memory I can only recall that killing one restaurant I ever patronized, and that one was in downtown DC. Most restaurant locations are ideally suited to, well, restaurants, so if the landlord is kicking you out anywhere less densely populated it is likely to make way for another restaurant with deeper pockets. I.e., a chain.
Complaints about smells and health issues are almost always linked to international restaurants, frequently run by recent immigrants accustomed to such smells but unused to healthy food practices. But yes, if this is the cuisine you like, this can happen a lot. On the bright (and scary!) side, US corporate protections often allow the same people to reopen the restaurant under a different name almost immediately, often even in the same space!
Food costs affect everyone, and independent restaurants are both more vulnerable to the problem AND better suited to handle it. Appleby’s can’t quickly change their menu, the local place down the street just needs a couple days to remove the suddenly-overpriced ingredients. Again, this is assuming that this is the kind of restaurant that is actually attracting people - such places tend to actually have good chefs who know how to shift a menu!
Lately I find myself eating out about once a week or so. I know where to get good food, I know how not to overspend, and I fastidiously avoid anything I can make myself. I consider myself a pretty good cook, but I’m not going to claim to be better than a decent professional, and since I like good food I like to seek it out!
Of course not, but again, those places are trying to out-chain the chains and that is a losing proposition. Of course, even make-from-scratch places will still buy some things premade, but not usually anything that they consider an important part of their flavor profile.
In my experience, different stores do a better job at different things. I go to one store for deli, meat, and fish, and another store for produce. The first has excellent meats, but their produce is overpriced and poor quality. The second has excellent and affordable produce, but their meat and fish departments make me cringe from smells alone.
I’ve seen some of the shortcuts Wal-Mart makes in other areas, if they are buying local it is only because it is the cheapest option. I have yet to see produce in a Wal-Mart that I would consider a good deal - it is usually substandard for minimal savings.
“Landlords are a pretty rare problem (even though there is a lot of complaining when it happens), in my memory I can only recall that killing one restaurant I ever patronized, and that one was in downtown DC. Most restaurant locations are ideally suited to, well, restaurants, so if the landlord is kicking you out it is likely to make way for another restaurant with deeper pockets. I.e., a chain.”
In places where real estate is at a premium, you bet this happens often. Don’t have to go too far for examples - you can often see this happening in SV or even Seattle. And the landlord will not have reservations about ripping the stove etc. out to make way for a high tech office that can pay significantly more. A chain will not move into the building just because there was a restaurant there.
Also, big chains are better suited to withstand food price fluctuations because they hedge their bets with long-term contracts way into the future. A small place cannot afford this - no one will enter into a contract for 5 years with a restaurant with a 2yr history.
Speaking of smells, it does not have to be an ethnic place - a local soup maker was forced out and got repeatedly fined for clean air act violation. It smelled like French onion soup…
Well…adding in restaurants…I like Brio and Bonefish Grill. I also like Panera, and really like how they keep certain favorites on the menu, but also add new items often enough.
If a wait at a restaurant is longer than twenty minutes…I won’t wait.
So many won’t take reservations for groups under eight people.
Oh, I have to share this! Years ago we had a big fundraising carnival for an organization, and 4 of us spent the entire day in the concession stand dumping huge cans of nacho cheese in crockpots and serving nachos and Frito pie. When the carnival ended, we all went out with our husbands for margaritas and the men ordered nachos. When the waiter brought our drinks, he said it would be a few minutes for the nachos. Right then we saw a guy making a beeline for the kitchen holding two new cans of the same brand of nacho cheese!
Now back to the topic of the thread: I hate shopping, but I love browsing at Barnes & Noble.
I used to love business travel because I could shop in different stores in each city. I would go to the mall and enjoy the regional and local shops. Now, if you dumped me into a mall somewhere there is no way you could tell what city you were in. It’s disappointing. We have some wonderful local shops in our neat, historic small-ish town that has a “Main Street” and is just 25 minutes out of Nashville.
My DH likes chains. I attribute it to two main things (1) he eats to live not lives to eat (As he always says) and (2) he traveled endlessly in his early and mid career and he liked consistency.
MOfWC, so true!!! I try to seek out unique stores (or even smaller chains) wherever I go, but it is really hard to find them in big malls. No wonder I high tailed for the Intimacy store right after finishing Boston marathon - we don’t have one in WA, and I love their brands of bras.
@MomofWildChild, if you live in Franklin, I am jealous. I totally agree with you that uniqueness is gone. It seems to slowly be making a comeback with artisan goods and foods gaining momentum and I give credit for a lot of that to our kids’ generation.
I hate, hate, hate supermarkets. Always have, even as a little girl. Yet I seem to spend the most time in them.
I wonder if it is related to an event that happened when I was little. Apparently I was not feeling well and my Mom kept me out of school but took me food shopping. There was a collision of two passenger planes above the supermarket. The whole store shook. This was in NYC.
My Mom took me down the road to see my aunt who worked in a lingerie shop to ask if she knew what happened. We passed people screaming and saying they saw bodies and body parts flying out of the sky. I think I started to cry. My Mom knew to leave and get me home.
It was, and still is, considered a major air crash.
