If you ignore the tiny chain at #1, look at the gap between CCF and their #2 competitor in sales per location. I think at some point I read that CCF was second only to Apple Store in revenue per square foot (I think in prime real estate corridors, excluding luxury or some similar criteria, it was a while ago).
Edit: first watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myRFzVmH1tg . Best way to analogize it is that CCF is the Katie Ledecky of casual chain restaurants. Because people who write about business and tech don’t really go to casual chain restaurants, nobody appreciates their accomplishments like they do Costco or In-n-Out.
Personally I’m not sure I’ve ever eaten in one. I like a good fast casual burger now and then it’s often a good choice late night or at an airport. Sometimes I’ll break down and eat at some casual chain at an airport or in some suburban location. But if there’s a location with a CCF there are probably other options I’m inclined to choose first.
The reason why everyone sleeps on the Cheesecake Factory is very simple. The problem CCF solves is simply never encountered by the upper middle class because entry into this stratum is socially coded by having an adventurous palate where outwardly acting like a picky eater is a mark of shame.
Thus, CCF is viewed as a class shibboleth because the problem CCF solves extremely well is getting together a group of people with lots of picky eaters who are all different kinds of picky eaters but who all still want good food and you have to pick a place you can all go. You're simply never expected to run into this problem if you run in upper middle class circles but it's a nightmare scenario for everyone else in cities without a CCF and having a CCF in your city solves it in a way that is a meaningful upgrade in your quality of life.
As a result, people vastly underestimate the difficulty of this problem and how poor CCF's competitors are compared to it and how much brand loyalty people who don't have this social coding have towards this company for perfectly logical reasons.
CCF's great accomplishment is not just realizing this but then designing their entire restaurant from the ground up to totally holistically solve this very hard problem and their near monopoly level profits are a reward for their hard work.
Sure—I'm not totally convinced by the class analysis but the big menu is definitely a reason to go. In a lot of cities, diners, especially Greek-owned diners, traditionally filled this role of restaurant with a menu the proverbial size of a phone book, but they're fewer in number and their menus have often shrank.
The "high-low" aesthetic the article mentions is important, too, I think. You can go there in a lot of contexts and it doesn't feel weird, because it isn't any normal genre of restaurant you have associations with, nor does it have a hokey theme. Teenagers can go, families can go, couples can go, coworkers can go. People go for dessert, people go for takeout, people go for drinks and appetizers.
fascinating comparison! can wholeheartedly confirm! A close friend was a super picky eater, and he'd order the same safe things while it allowed "adventurous" (for the 1980s) eaters to sample greek and italian foods not found at strictly-American places like Friendly's.
The problem with chain restaurants is that the more they offer the more likely it's pre-prepared frozen/canned food that they just reheated or dropped in a fryer.
I set out to try a wide variety of local 'mom and pop' pizza restaurants and I quickly realized that all of them used the same supplier. In fact most of them even use the same sauce recipe.
I understand why people won’t be happy about what you are saying, but what you saying grabs at the essential nature of their success.
I don’t think it’s an “upper middle” thing but it is the class thing. It’s the default. The mass produced essential corner store or bar. And anyone can be seen there, and the food is customizable and nobody ever gets embarrassed or loses face for picking the place and the service is consistent.
It is the quintessential Hydreuma — for every thirsty Roman.
It's impressive the contortions people go to try to shame other for enjoying decent food at a decent price, and not obsessed with proving they are cool. Luckily, we're busy enjoying our food, family, and friends.
This is a novel insight that the article doesn’t touch on.
It’s absolutely a class indicator. You could order a steak well done at The Factory and you’d fit right in. It fits in with people who have a concept of “fine dining”, which they may not go to much but understand what it means. In other circles in big cities, fine dining is equally rare but spending $75-150/pp at a “casual” (meaning no tablecloth) restaurant is normal. $100 for casual dining is the exact opposite of what The Factory is about.
This is exactly what people were really talking about a few years ago on Reddit with the post about being in New York, but then eating at the Times Square Olive Garden.
Only a few blocks away is Bryant Park Grill. Prices at the two restaurants are surprisingly similar and both have over 500 seats. However, different people will enjoy their meal, or be uncomfortable or even offended at either one.
It could also explain why Yelp restaurant reviews are so baffling. They need to figure out how to cluster reviewers by what “language” they’re actually speaking on restaurants.
It’s one reason the old Zagat’s was so useful as the original crowd-sourced reviews. No one but foodies would fill out their (paper) questionnaires so the guides were correspondingly on target for other foodies.
> the upper middle class because entry into this stratum is socially coded by having an adventurous palate where outwardly acting like a picky eater is a mark of shame.
This is changing or has already changed. People in the upper middle class love to exclude certain basic food groups like meat, milk, bread etc. as a projection of their identity.
I find myself agreeing with the class part of your analysis, but think there are other options they fill this niche…
Outback Steakhouse,
The local diner (more so if family owned),
Applebees and TGIF.
Is CCF viewed as higher quality/status than these? I occasionally eat at Outback but not the others, partly location, partly because I find CCF overpriced for very mediocre food.
Applebee’s has long been criticized on the Internet for having food that is pre-made offsite and heated on-premise – something this article swears is common among chains but which CCF does not do. Yeah, the CCF dining room decor and packed waiting room convey a quite different status than your more pub-like “neighborhood” Applebee’s and TGIF’s, or your typically humble diner.
Saddly most "local diners" are now buying premade food from offsite and heating it. It is all the same premade food too, the only difference is the order things are on the menu, and what item they call the house special.
I was about to argue this (because I'm bored!), but then I remembered an anecdote. My mother-in-law (typical rural Midwest small town ex-housewife) mentioned to me one day that the rolls that I made were delicious.
I was a bit confused because I hadn't made any rolls. I had baked a couple loaves of bread though. Didn't think much of it until an hour later I went into the kitchen and thought, "why the hell is the top of this loaf all picked at?"
Then I recalled the comment. I had made challah, a braided Jewish bread. She had never seen braided bread before and thought the braids were rolls all smushed together.
Interesting. I would have assumed CCF prepped food similarly to the other “cheap” chains.
But, I’m not the target audience. I’ll pick a local ethnic place over a chain almost every time. And only use chains when forced by co-workers who won’t deviate from a generic “American” menu.
I fully agree with your points. I’m not sure if it’s class or general inclination to travel etc. but I’m imagining if I went out with friends and peers at a conference, say, the horror at the idea people would have of going to a chain, including CCF, rather than some locally appropriate restaurant—even if a local chain.
But, yeah, most of my friends and people I travel with would think nothing of going to a Chinese restaurant and eating with chopsticks.
Not a judgement and we’d probably have a perfectly good time and dinner at a CCF but it would have pretty much a zero chance of happening.
I do find it interesting though how many people this simple observation seems to upset.
Because chain restaurants are generally kinda gross.
The typical American chain restaurant is going to serve you something that starts with low-quality ingredients, then gets a bunch of sugar, corn syrup, seed oil, artificial food coloring, emulsifiers etc added to it until it roughly approximates the flavor, texture and color of higher-quality ingredients (at the cost of being unhealthy). Then it has various chemicals added to it to act as preservatives or maintain texture or appearance during shipping and storage and re-heating. Then it's packaged into cheap single-use plastic bags or containers that slowly leach endocrine disrupting chemicals into the food, or rapidly leach them during reheating in a microwave.
The end result is that you get something that is edible, but probably kinda gross tasting unless your palette gets used to packaged foods and fast foods, and which is going to make you fat, depressed, distracted and tired.
There's a reason America has an obesity epidemic, diabetes epidemic, falling fertility rates and widespread prescriptions of drugs for depression, anxiety, adhd, etc, and it's the food the average American is eating.
The "horror" is less about going to the chain restaurant, and more the derision you'd face from your peers at suggesting it. The logic goes "If you like shitty chain food, it's because you don't have good points of reference to compare against, because you haven't experienced a wide variety of cuisine, because you're poor".
The “horror” is that you will only live to eat a fixed number of meals, so why on Earth would you waste one of your “meal slots” eating food at a chain that’s no better than reheated leftovers in your fridge?
Are you asking that question unironically? Why a lunch spent with your colleagues at CCF might be worth considering over the refrigerated leftovers waiting in the break room?
For me, it's like you suggest - more disinterest than horror. But it happens regularly with out-of-town coworkers. There are lots of above average ethnic places near my home and office (same 'hood). But, in a large enough group, there's usually one or two meat-n-potatoes person who doesn't want to try anything new.
> And only use chains when forced by co-workers who won’t deviate from a generic “American” menu.
Completely tangential, but a local Korean place (Haru K-BBQ) has fried chicken as one of the “Western” items. However, the fried chicken itself is a reason to go because they do such a nice take on this item.
There's an Indian fried chicken fusion type thing called pepper chicken that I think is eventually going to take the country by storm
I honestly think that some fusion fried chicken joint might be the next Chipotle type hit. Indian Korean Japanese Chinese Mexican styles of fried chicken all under one house
Yea, I've always associated Cheesecake Factory with every other generic chain restaurant--exactly like Applebee's, TGIFridays, Outback, Olive Garden, and so on. It's a place you take large groups that contain picky eaters.
If you are lucky enough to have quality local ethnic places and have no particular love for mainstream American food, fine. Many towns in America can't do much better than a Chinese buffet, though, for which American chain restaurants are competitive alternatives.
I would like to buy the same pre made meals and heat it up at my home, at a reduced cost. The quality isn't bad, I'd even say "good" in some cases and my kids like the chicken tenders. Kind of a Papa Murphy's take and bake casual dining thing. Does this exist?
I don't know if they have a reach outside the upper Midwest, but that seems to describe Schwan's. They have a wide variety of premade foods ready for reheating or cooking (e.g., cheesy potato puffs). Haven't gotten food from them in a while, but I remember it being pretty good. At least, far better than supermarket frozen meals. I've actually been known to follow a Schwan's truck until it stopped so I could buy on the spot :-)
They typically have a number of households on a weekly rotation and deliver in temperature controlled trucks. You can buy food when they show up at your house or if you're well-organized, preorder.
They probably also ship.
Ignore the "salmonella vanilla" remarks: that was a long time ago :-)
Most cities have a few local places that do similar things - mine certainly does. Some are dedicated take-home places, others are restaurants that also package prepared meals during their slow hours. The locals always know about the good ones. You'll find the majority of these places/meals are pasta, largely because pasta stores easily and reheats consistently.
As for chains, Maggiano's used to do an eat-one-take-one deal, where for a $5-10 add-on you could get a pre-chilled pasta dish to take home, but I'm not sure they still do. That deal was great for takeout. A hot meal for tonight, leftovers for tomorrow, throw the chilled one in the freezer.
I don’t know but I would assume the big food service providers don’t have some special “secret sauce” versus what you can buy in the freezer cases of the supermarket and at least assemble pretty quickly.
I’ve also definitely found frozen stuff I can order like soft shell crab and soup dumplings that make super easy meals.
I don’t know about meals but several popular restaurants chains offer branded food in the grocer’s freezer. From what I’ve seen they are mostly appetizers but there are also some entrees and desserts.
Applebees and TGIF also try to market themselves as the respectable neighborhood bar for suburban areas that don't otherwise have one; they're a little more casual and the food isn't as much the center of attention as it is at CCF.
I wish people would say why they are downvoting you. Because, in my experience, you are right on. I assume the downvoters disagree, but, why do they disagree?
I didn't vote, but I find myself a little confused. I suspect the whole "upper middle class" bit has to be a regional thing; it simply doesn't fit my experiences at all. Around where I live, there's certainly no stigma at all about being a picky eater, or at least not one that's in any way specific to a social class. Plenty of people have preferences, and there's no shortage of places to go that offer genetic (casual or fine) dining that everyone will accept.
Do you know any adults who will literally only eat chicken tenders or a cheeseburger at restaurants, thus Thai/Vietnamese/Indian/new hip joint, etc. are not going to work?
I would observe that there’s a reason steakhouses are often a standard for customer dinners. They’re also usually at least so-so fish and vegetable options but nothing is too adventurous and they’re considered a safe upscale choice.
Class distinction is a second order effect and isn’t really the topic being discussed. The primary mover is pickiness, which does generally track with class.
A mostly disappointing meal for everyone involved. If you know someone is picky ahead of time the meal can be steered towards a place that's accommodating. If, however, everyone is surprised by the picky eater then you're left with some disappointing choices. You either ruin everyone's expectations by changing to a different restaurant at the last minute, or you watch the picky eater try to make the best of what they probably consider a bad situation. Maybe they try something new and hope they like it, but most likely they order the blandest thing they can and everyone gets to feel a little bad about the person ordering a bowl of plain noodles for dinner so they can all eat at the place they planned on/wanted to.
And of course, people don't want to spend time with people who make them feel bad, so the picky eater will gradually be pushed to the fringe, and left out of plans.
I’m not sure if I’d use the term but if someone in a group is constantly high maintenance with respect to food, both the group and they themselves probably lose interest in paddling against the current.
It’s not even really pickiness per se. If some group always wants to just eat fast food I’m going to be less inclined to join them. No value judgement. Just not my thing.
If one's position and circle is below the class threshold that cares for these things, such a stigma would be invisible - it just wouldn't be a thing that they'd have seen in their lived experience.
And, here's the hook to what you say regarding it being a regional thing: this class distinctions are also applied at the regional level. E.g. whole states can be considered "lower social class" (regardless if they have millionaires or well off upper middle class people and so on).
In "high class" states or circles within a state, though, the stigma would a quite real thing (even if it's just an inconsequental matter, as seen from outside).
It's not about wealth levels either, as class concerns are just as high in stressed-to-appear-appropriately-high-class aspiring classes, that make less than what a developer does, but their circles are all about class distinctions and their shibboleths. The stereotypical "New Yorker" reader would be a total weirdo about such matters, even more stressed and awkward about following all the BS rules than people actually belonging to the 0.1%.
But even if you are a billionaire, you can be the low-class butt of the joke to "old money" types.
(That's my understanding of the US class system on this matter - there are some quite good books about it, "Class" by Paul Fussell is quite good. It's also a subject that certain kinds of literature and journalism wont shut up about).
This seems accurate to me. I've lived in the Bay Area and currently live in the southeast and have noticed that those who are very wealthy in the southeast don't seem to have the same interests in style, food, or fashion as those with equivalent wealth in the Bay Area (not saying one way is right or wrong). For the wealthy in the southeast, houses tend to be larger but constructed in mostly the same way as regular houses rather than having different architectural styles. Like housing, food tends to be "the same but nicer" instead of more exotic, e.g., a Ruth's Chris rather a Galician steakhouse.
Related side story: when I lived near SF, I saw in the news that the lone Olive Garden in the city (in Stonestown Galleria) was going to close. I asked out loud "Who on earth eats at the Olive Garden in San Francisco when there are so many other options for authentic Italian?" My wife, who was sitting next to me, got a sheepish look on her face. It turns out she drove into the city all the time specifically to go to that Olive Garden. She said it reminded her of home and she liked the nostalgia of it haha
> this class distinctions are also applied at the regional level.
Living in Hawai'i it would strike me how popular CCF was for people that came all that way (typically middle class Americans) and have access to tons of great variety in ethnic places they may not at home, along with local joints that would serve familiar food with the option of local flavour. But some of these comments put it in good context, that it is the familiar and safe choice and has a special or semi-fancy vibe to a large subset of those people.
I don't think I've eaten in one since I was a preteen and may have only been once, but come to think of it, at the time I grew up rural 45 minutes to the nearest small city, eating at cheesecake factory did seem like a special occasion.
I find this obsession with the "class" of restaurants in the US comical.
Nobody gives a fuck if you go and eat in a "middling" establishment equivalent to CCF in these here parts, even if you're old money. And nobody cares of most other US shibboleths of class.
Whereas in the US it's as if something like CCF or, god forbid, Olive Garden, has leprosy, for some types of "high class" or wanabee so, people.
I'm not sure where you live, but I'm going to guess you are someplace where most restaurants have not discovered they can fire the chefs, buy factory produced food and reheat it with cheap labor. There is a massive quality difference, and so people who like good food will not eat in some places.
When I go to Europe or Asia, I have high confidence I can walk into a random restaurant/cafe and get good food made with high quality fresh ingredients on sight. Of course not every restaurant/cafe is good, but enough are.
>I'm not sure where you live, but I'm going to guess you are someplace where most restaurants have not discovered they can fire the chefs, buy factory produced food and reheat it with cheap labor. There is a massive quality difference, and so people who like good food will not eat in some places.
Europe. I've tried such american restaurants like CCF, and they're not just "reheated factory produced food". Even Olive Garden isn't that (the prepare stuff on-site, contrary to myth). In fact, they're better than many local ones.
I'd say it's less about liking good food than liking to signal class status. The same people have no issue eating shoddily made chinese take-away or in-and-out or total prepackaged factory crap sold in their upclass super market, because those are not associated with a class stigma.
It occurred to me, perhaps a difference is that price point of restaurant isn't full of megachains in Europe? In the land of cookie-cutter strip malls, buying into heavily corporatised consumerism in the presence of more 'authentic' options is responsible for part of the stigma of such places.
In Australia at least where there are some chains for casual/fast food but not so much for restaurants, I haven't sensed this stigma because that dining niche is occupied by the local hotel's restaurant or a pub with low to no pretenses but a decent to quite good meal.
>buying into heavily corporatised consumerism in the presence of more 'authentic' options is responsible for part of the stigma of such places
I'm not sure it's that, since 99% of the consumption of those same snobs are heavily corporatised consumerism. It's just the expensive kind marketed to more affluent suckers. They're for example OK with Starbucks, the kind of "heavily corporatised consumerism", and all kind of BS upscale consumerist brands like Lululemon.
Class matters most to those on the precipice of their class distinction. If you're old-money, and your entire social circle is old-money, then you don't view the things you do as being "high class", they're just normal things you do. So it goes with the middle and low classes.
You see the most obsession with class concerns in areas where you have people who are class mobile: There's a lot of nouveau riche and upper-middle class people in tech, because tech has been a massive boom industry. Likewise you see a fair amount of class concern among people falling down the social ladder, such as the generations that grew up within environment of an old-money fortune, but for whatever reason that money was lost.
That's the thing, the person that first responded to me mentioned that money didn't matter, class was an attitude that only certain people in certain areas have.
I feel like everyone is talking in circles just wanting to be right on the internet.
As someone obsessed with Hawaiian food (lived in Vegas most of my life), I just wanted to hit all the local places when I visited. We did eat at Roy’s steakhouse though.
Well, it is the ninth island and all :) never been to a location on the mainland, wiki seems to suggest most were not under original ownership, actually were owned by Bloomin Brands for a while who runs several of the concept megachains that would be in TCF's class, so those may not make my arbitrary cut.
This seems correct. Buffett lives in Omaha (where he is part of the upper class) and eats basically only McDonald's, steak and canned soda. In NY and LA among middle-class circles a 10-year-old child with these eating habits would be pitied for his parents' failure to educate him correctly.
I guess I'm low-class, but it must be exhausting to even see any of this, let alone care about it or worry about which shibboleths I happen to be showing.
Cheesecake Factory is actually pretty good, though. My go-to is the spicy cashew chicken, which is really tasty, and big enough that I always take some home.
A tip if you ever do go: When the bread arrives, eschew the butter and ask for a side of ranch dressing to dip the bread in. It sounds weird (I don’t even like ranch normally) and everybody I’ve ever told about it looks at me skeptically, but once they try it they instantly become a convert.
I’ve eaten at Cheesecake Factory a couple of times but it always feels so heavy to me. I’d rather pay the higher prices at Din Tai Feng and get more manageable portions.
Two things: a) it's Din Tai Fung; and b) nobody who's aiming for The Cheesecake Factory across the street from the convention center is going to accidentally wind up at the Pacific Place (or, worse, UVillage) Din Tai Fung.
They are completely different menus and dining experiences. Though if The Cheesecake Factory ever adds soup dumplings to their menu, I bet they will be pretty good and cheaper.
I learned mandarin in the mainland so the romanization of 鼎泰丰 stuck in my head is different. Also, I was thinking more Bellevue square, where Din Tai Fung is fairly located across the street, so it’s actually a choice to make (though getting a seat at cheese cake factory is usually easier). I would put them up as comparable: they are both chains, they are both kind of pricey for chains, and if I were in Beijing, it would be a legitimate question to think about going to that or a western food chain.
It is expensive. It Bellevue at least, there are other options (Topgun for example) but requiring driving, and you are still spending $80 or so. DTF is ok once in awhile, it’s not like there are tons of other Taiwanese dim sum places, most of them are going to be Cantonese.
If you ignore the tiny chain at #1, look at the gap between CCF and their #2 competitor in sales per location. I think at some point I read that CCF was second only to Apple Store in revenue per square foot (I think in prime real estate corridors, excluding luxury or some similar criteria, it was a while ago).
Edit: first watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myRFzVmH1tg . Best way to analogize it is that CCF is the Katie Ledecky of casual chain restaurants. Because people who write about business and tech don’t really go to casual chain restaurants, nobody appreciates their accomplishments like they do Costco or In-n-Out.