January 22, 2019 — Trends indicate that Americans are spending more and more of their money on eating out, and an increasing proportion of the ever-larger restaurant spend is being done at fast-casual establishments.
Starting in 2010, Americans’ total spending on food away-from-home started to pull away from spending on food prepared and eaten at home, to the point that Americans spent USD 100 billion (EUR 88 billion) more on eating out in 2017 than on food at home.
“Food away from home started taking up [more of peoples’] food budgets,” Richard Barry, program manager for the National Fisheries Institute, at last week’s Global Seafood Market Conference in Coronado, California.
Among that dining-out experience, one restaurant segment saw the most explosive growth: Chain quick-service restaurants, also known as “fast casual” restaurants. Even during the 2007 to 2009 recession, the segment added thousands of new locations, and in 2015 the segment had more than 200,000 restaurants across the country, up from just over 150,000 in 2005.
“The big driver behind the foodservice segment is these chain quick-service restaurants,” Barry said.