The Rise And Fall Of The Buffet Chain - Cheddar Explains

at one point or another we've been to a buffet and at one point or another most of us have loved them for me it was when i was a kid it was a magical place where i could get chicken tenders pizza and cake all on the same small plate a place where going up for seconds or even thirds was not frowned upon but now looking back these buffets can be pretty gross sure the food is presumably cooked to acceptable standards but it can sit out behind those sneeze guards for hours not to mention the issues that arise when an unknown number of unwashed hands touch the same serving utensils and that's not just by germaphobia buffets had been responsible for virus outbreaks like multiple e coli flare-ups and the largest outbreak of hepatitis a in u.s history but surprisingly we can't blame the death of buffets on disease alone buffets may have been doomed from the start buffets have been around for centuries but the business of buffets is fairly recent in 1945 entertainment manager herbert mcdonald was working on the el rancho casino floor in las vegas as the story goes mcdonald was dealing with an angry gambling customer today we'd call him hangry so mcdonald went to the kitchen and brought out a platter of cold cuts cheese and bread a crowd gathered all picking from the sampling mcdonald's got an idea his buckaroo buffet offered casino patrons cold cuts salad seafood and quote every possible variety of hot and cold entrees to appease the howling coyote in your innard end quote all of that for just a dollar the idea was that you were trying to keep consumers in the casinos as long as possible so buffet became an interesting option soon every major casino in vegas had an all-you-can-eat buffet and soon after that buffets began to spread across the country customers flocked to sizzler golden corral and old country buffets at their peak in the late 1990s there were over 20 000 buffets in the united states but that peak did not continue to rise nor did it plateau buffets had been on the decline since the early 2000s since 2000 buffet incorporated which owns and operates the hometown and old country buffet chains has closed 78 of their restaurants other chains like ryan's buffet have downsized by as much as 96 why you may ask well cleanliness definitely plays a factor one of the biggest things that we really have to focus on when it comes to food safety in any setting is temperature control and uh and then the second thing that we really focus on is hygiene and in a buffet situation the biggest uh issues are really controlling both of those things making sure that we're holding food on the buffet at the right temperature and making sure that we're turning that food over meaning that it's not sitting there for hours and hours and hours it's not just the food we need to worry about either buffet goers should also be concerned about other customers service utensils in a buffet setting there are these common high-touch items like literally everyone who is serving that food has their hands on it there there's an issue of you know virus being transferred from hand to hand next person comes along touches that those tongs and can transfer it to their hands you know there's always a chance of picking up uh pathogens from tongs and this chance was realized numerous times another e coli outbreak has the tables at a spokane sizzler empty tonight in 1993 four separate sizzler locations in oregon and washington were infected by an e coli outbreak it was later determined that cross contamination was likely the cause of the outbreak in total 93 people were infected and 15 people were hospitalized seven years later another outbreak hit sizzler another 64 confirmed cases of e coli but public health officials counted 551 probable e coli cases one case led to the death of a child the wisconsin department of health later concluded that the outbreak was caused when employees cross-contaminated fresh watermelon with raw meat products then in november 2003 a pennsylvania location of the tex-mex buffet chain chi-chi's became the site of the worst hepatitis a outbreak in u.s history someone probably an employee spread the hepatitis virus by not washing their hands after going to the bathroom the outbreak was traced back to raw or undercooked green onions in total 565 people were infected three of which later died as a consequence of their hepatitis a illness what's worse for buffets is that many of these incidents took place during an american healthy food revolution around this time organic and healthy foods were becoming mainstream in fact in 2002 the usda released its national standards for organic products organic food sales grew by 17 to 20 percent a year for the next five years while conventional food sales grew by about two to three percent a year by 2003 organic foods could be found in nearly 20 000 natural food stores and 73 of conventional grocery stores in the united states we've branched out and seen more consumers looking for healthier better for you products the rise of fast casual restaurants that typically had kind of a specific cuisine that they would service the less guest traffic at a lot of buffet locations and with that less guest traffic it made it a lot less profitable buffets tried to evolve but even some of their healthy options didn't fit the bill for example in many cases vegetables are tossed with oils to make them look appealing so even though you thought you were making a healthy decision they were probably riddled with hidden calories much of the food industry has been able to adapt to changing consumer habits but not buffets and that's because of the business model to understand why the buffet business model is faulty let's compare it with a traditional sit-down restaurant any restaurant has three main expenditures staff food and rent slash utilities in a traditional sit-down restaurant a third of costs go to wait staff a third goes to food costs and roughly 20 percent goes to rent and utilities leaving most restaurants with remaining margins of roughly 10 to 15 percent restaurants reach these profit margins by selling their foods at marked up prices usually threefold to cover the salaries for the weight staff and other expenditures so if you buy a sixty dollar steak at a restaurant it's likely the restaurant paid about twenty dollars for it buffets similarly have these same three core expenditures staff costs food and rent slash utilities while buffets are able to save on staff costs because of their self-service model labor's still required in fact it accounts for roughly 25 of the operating budget due to the large amounts of food that need to be prepared every day the food itself accounts for roughly 45 of a buffet's budget buffets have to order large quantities of a sprawling variety of food basically what they save on labor costs is spent on additional food costs however because of the fixed price all-you-can-eat model buffets cannot up charge for specific items like traditional restaurants do profit margins were thin i mean that's pretty common across the restaurant industry to begin with you know this is an industry where you know something like 5 profit margins would be a great number for most restaurant companies but most buffet restaurants weren't able to come close to those numbers many floated around a one to two percent profit margin and lastly buffet locations tend to be larger than traditional sit-down restaurants in order to accommodate as many guests as possible when you throw in the same kind of rent uh and typically these are larger than facilities than what you're typically dealing with for a casual dining restaurant um you know and then kind of the other expenses too that's where you get that low single digit margins for it and finally a new competitor entered the fray as we moved into the 90s and the 2000s we started to see a lot of growth of other you know concepts particularly in the fast casual category ultimately the combination of a flawed business model the rise of natural food trends and shifting consumer preferences left buffets scrambling to adapt but just because the buffet may not be here forever doesn't mean there won't be a one-stop shop for all of your food desires in recent years a variation of the model has been rearing its head the same age you see things like food halls and starting to pop up there may be a chance to uh you know re reimagine a lot of the the buffet concepts and maybe rethink it and maybe there could be a potential second leg uh second win for a lot of these concepts so if you were a huge buffet fan you might also love these food hauls that are popping up just be prepared to spend more than 20 bucks thanks for watching so what are your thoughts on buffets would you still go to one tell us in the comments below and while you're at it make sure you hit the subscribe button so you'll be notified whenever we post new videos

Channel: Cheddar

Views: 577,772

Rating: 4.8454108 out of 5

Keywords: Cheddar, cheddar explains, cheddar explores, explainer, buffets, buffet chain, restaurant, restaurant chain, chain, food, business case study, golden corral, old country buffet, hometown buffet, cicis pizza, sizzlin, salad bar, coronavirus buffet, coronavirus restaurant, covid-19 restaurant, business model, buffet clean, las vegas buffet, sizzler, chi-chi's, restaurant industry, sit down restaurants, fast casual, fast food

Id: whLXKy-S2so

Length: 9min 27sec (567 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 29 2020