I mean, it's a themed casual dining experience along the lines of Rainforest Cafe, Buca di Beppo, Hard Rock Cafe, Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., etc. What "rules" are they breaking?
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.
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.
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.
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.
I suppose it varies, but it only needs to be true some of the time for CCF to be profitable.
It's more about people in peer groups preoccupied with class distinctions, vs, say, 90% of Americans who could not give less fucks about it.
Region plays a role in the distribution and size of such peer groups though.
Added: Per another comment, people can also be picky not with respect to not eating unusual foods but with respect to not eating mediocre food.
What does it look like when somebody gets “socially in trouble” for being picky? What actually happens to them (socially) in this instance?
I’ve never seen or heard of anything like this, so I’m really curious about it.
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.
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).
Indeed.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
I feel like everyone is talking in circles just wanting to be right on the internet.
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.
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.
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
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.
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 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 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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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
The scrambled eggs came in a carton, though they are cooked. Other eggs are more likely to be cooked onsite
Bacon is often pre-cooked and just warmed, though cooking fresh bacon still happens.
Toast is factory made bread, though the final toasting was done onsite. Most Americans have never had real bread.
The above is breakfast - the meal most likely to be made on site. Lunch and dinner are far worse.
[sigh]
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.
I’ve also definitely found frozen stuff I can order like soft shell crab and soup dumplings that make super easy meals.
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.
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 :-)
CCF thrives in upper middle class areas.
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.
- https://bryantparkgrillnyc.com/
- https://www.olivegarden.com/locations/ny/new-york/nyc-times-...
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.
So is the picky eater problem a shibboleth of an SES class higher or lower than upper-middle?
I can see lower classes being picky because of limited exposure to novel foods, but higher classes because of unrealistic culinary expectations.
Upper-class = won't
The word "picky" demonstrates the social wrapper in action:
lower-class "can't eat that food - I'm scared of it / it might throw off my digestion / not be worth the price"
is disguised as the upper-class "I could eat that but would rather have..."
to save face.
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.
Have no idea how people have the stomach to invest in the prepared food business.
https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/CAKE/cheesecake-fa...
And yet, I drive by there every morning on my way to work, and twice a week there's a Sysco truck backing in to their parking lot. What exactly are they delivering, if not pre-made.
If I wanted to spend $150 eating out, I'd want something slightly less nasty than their crap. It tastes like microwaved Stouffers.
Rather than them being supergenius restauranteurs, it really does look like they just managed to survive the last decade when so many other chain restaurants went tits up since 2008. That coupled with covid cabin fever that seems like it never went away, makes for the sort of busy some mistake for grand success.
Sure you could send your chef to the farmer’s market to pick tomatoes but that is more costly and sometimes he’d return empty handed.
I'm guessing that for the pasta, they're boiling water. The rest of their menu looks like cheeseburgers and sandwiches. So maybe they're frying up a frozen patty once in awhile. Are they baking the bread and buns for these sandwiches themselves?
They also have alot of weird appetizers. Are they wrapping those spring rolls themselves, or do those come frozen out of a box and ready to deep fry? Fried cheese sticks, asparagus, and zucchini... are you telling me those are hand-breaded, or do they come frozen out of a box?
(Before you answer, consider carefully if someone who has never wrapped a spring roll before can get it right on even the 10th try after watching a 40 second tutorial video on the ipad they have bolted up above the prep table.)
There are half a dozen soups. Are those not coming out of a can?
Crusted/breaded chicken... that's not coming out of the box frozen?
https://www.thecheesecakefactory.com/menu
Oh, looks like you can get onion rings. Are those not coming frozen out of the box to be deep-fried? French fries?
When I get the crispy pineapple chicken and shrimp, are you telling me that they cut up a pineapple that morning for when that's ordered, or do they cut up the pineapple when I order it? Or, is it frozen in a plastic bag, like those god-awful stir-fries you get in the frozen section at the grocery store?
Did they slice the corn off the cob that morning themselves, or does that come out of a plastic bag, all flash-frozen?
Do they have a rice steamer in the back, or is that in one of those plastic per-serving bags that are microwaved?
The only stuff on this menu that are both "made themselves" and "not fast food" are the steaks (and good luck getting a good one there).
This place shares its menu (literally) with Fazolis. There are CCF-branded items on Fazolis menu the last time I went there. This is TGI Friday's level bullshit. They aren't some big-data driven Nostradamuses (Nostradami?), the link's just a gussed-up press release.
I don't really eat at the cheesecake factory so I can't speak to that.
They're not doing them. Any of them. If someone made such extraordinary claims, reasonable people would require extraordinary evidence.
I've provided quite a bit of corroboration to the idea that they're not doing any of it. Sure, my case is circumstantial, but I think that's permissible outside of a criminal courtroom, where the accusation is "non-crime, doing it like everyone else" without so much as the hint of slander.
You're all nuts. Nothing said on HN outside of a very narrow focus of technology should ever be taken for granted.
Have you worked in a commercial kitchen? I thought it was pretty tough but quite rewarding to make big portions of tasty food.
It would surprise me if CCF isn’t doing this with some of their ingredients.
Assuming you don't order alcohol, and avoid specialty foods (lobster in the Midwest, proper steak pretty much anywhere) it shouldn't be hard to get a meal for two under $50 in most casual places. If I'm willing to spend more than that, we're going straight to fine dining
If you are getting an appetizer, dinner, and dessert, then add another $20 to $30, but very, very few people should be eating that many calories and sugar/sat fats.
In short, it's about making an experience that draws people in who are looking for the comfort/familiarity/ease of a chain, while not just relying on that. The Cheesecake Factory is an above-average restaurant masquerading as a Sysco-food-reheating-service.
The very large menu is a feature--something for everyone--that would be a bug if a lot of other restaurants tried it because the execution is often so dismal once a particular level of size or growth (or both) is reached.
Nothing else is close to vegan, unless you're into ordering Chicken Lettuce Wraps without Chicken.
Vegetarian bumps that to 52 menu items.
It also does limit the choice of dressing, for example anything with mayo is off limits.
They just haven't figured out how to keep vegans from spoiling in a commercial kitchen yet. They're high maintenance, a bit too big for the freezer, and the vacuum packer tends to deprive them of oxygen.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/when-herbivores-ar...
Horses sometimes eat chickens too.
Which is an actual item on the menu
https://www.thecheesecakefactory.com/menu/appetizers/thai-le...
[0] https://aviyer2010.com/2012/09/05/the-cheesecake-factory-and... [1] https://www.upkeep.com/learning/how-to-calculate-restaurant-...
> Proteins, sauces, veggies, the dressings that go in their gigantic salads, the chicken marsala and mushrooms — it’s cooked on the spot. If there’s any part of the Cheesecake Factory that resembles an industrial machine, it’s the multiple stations and line cooks needed to create handmade food for every meal. ...
> “Their quality, their execution, and consistency across the country — it is always the same. And that’s a compliment! That’s impeccable,” pastry chef and Food Network star Young says, “The sauces, the dressings, everything is made in-house. That level of consistency doesn’t happen anywhere else.”
This is in the last section, titled "The Cheesecake Factory is a marvel." That section is the most interesting part, because it talks about the execution required to make a large amount of a wide variety of food from scratch, at scale, consistently.
What will also be interesting imo is seeing what CCF looks like in another 20 years after we've (maybe) gone through another recession. Will they cut back the menu to save labor costs from needing so many people who can cook wildly different dishes at the same time? Smaller restaurants with less kitchen space? More centralization of food prep that is then shipped into an individual location flash frozen?
Businesses that try to expand too much (in all senses of the idea) will face scaling issues and potentially need to cut scope to increase efficiency and lower costs, or be forced to raise prices to compensate. CCF has been around for 45 years according to Wikipedia and has only gotten bigger and more complex at the individual store level. For a restaurant, that is an incredible feat and deserves a lot of analysis that can hopefully be shared with smaller chains or owner-operators to help them find profitability with their existing "small" menus.
Their market cap has not gone anywhere in 10+ years and they earn meager profit margins, so I assume people whose job it is to analyze the businesses have mostly predicted there is not much room for expansion.
But just still being around in 20 years would be a huge accomplishment (which I think it will achieve). I could roll off a dozen sit-down chain restaurants that were pretty damn popular not very long ago that are dead or on their last legs. TGIFriday, Tony Roma, Marie Callendar, Houlihans, Macaroni Grill, Claim Jumper...
I'm also making that prediction. Restaurants are especially susceptible to enshittification. I remember when I worked at Ruby Tuesday in the 90's, it was upscale enough that all servers wore a shirt and tie. They were big on polished brass and wood interior, coupled with above-average food made mostly fresh. These days, it's a glorified Burger King with a salad bar.
As a whole, Americans are demonstrating that they care more about the food quality than the service at a restaurant, by eating at restaurants that, holding price approximately equal, sacrifice service in exchange for better food, rather than eating at family-dining establishments that do the opposite.