State Champ Radio Red Lobster
HipHopWired Featured Video
CLOSE
Source: Roberto Machado Noa / Getty / Red Lobster
Red Lobster possibly going out of business? Say it ain’t so.
Folks on social media are panicking right now because they might have to find another spot to enjoy cheddar bay biscuits and endless crab legs for graduation day, Mother’s Day or after Easter service.
Spotted on TMZ via Bloomberg, iconic seafood restaurant chain Red Lobster is mulling bankruptcy as the company tries to figure out how to restructure its debt and other expenses, including restaurant leases and rising labor costs, as the celebrity gossip site reports.
Some even point to popular promotions like endless shrimp hurting the restaurant and the chain, which is bleeding cash due to the pandemic.
Per TMZ:
There’s also this tidbit that some are resurfacing amid this news — namely, the fact that Red Lobster’s recent endless shrimp reportedly hurt their bottom line quite badly … only for them to pivot to endless lobster after reporting a $12.5 million operating loss in ’23’s 4th quarter.
Even before the $12 mil hit … Red Lobster was bleeding cash, with reports saying they’d suffered a $19 million loss through the first 9 months of ’23… attributed to the pandemic, among other issues. Some minority owners in the biz have also started to jump ship.
For those who know about running a business and financial issues, filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy does not mean the end for the restaurant that Beyoncé at once had popping cause she sang, “When he fuck me good, I take his ass to Red Lobster.”
Despite knowing that, the reactions to Red Lobster possibly filing for bankruptcy are flowing like butter you pour on your lobster tails, and they are hilarious.
One user hilariously wrote on X, formerly Twitter, “they still got them unlimited crab legs cause if so I’ll go tomorrow.”
“oh lawd somebody save the biscuits,” another person wrote in response to the news of Red Lobster considering chapter 11 bankruptcy.
“How did we let this happen???? Y’all too bougie for Red Lobstas?!?,” another post on X read.
We don’t think Red Lobster is going anywhere, but we are always here for funny reactions. You can see those in the gallery below.
2. Sharing means caring
3. Solid suggestions
4. Very important question
HipHopWired Featured Video
Source: Richard Levine / Getty
Apparently, when Red Lobster promoted its Ultimate Endless Shrimp deal, the company had severely underestimated how much people love shrimp—and it cost the seafood restaurant giant $11 million in quarterly operating losses.
According to the New York Times, Red Lobster’s “irresistible” all-you-can-eat shrimp promotion was a little too irresistible, so much so that the company was forced to raise the price to $25 from $20 after the popular promotion caused a drop in the restaurant chan’s third-quarter profit—which is generally the opposite of what a popular promotional offer is designed to do.
From the Times:
Thai Union Group, which owns a large stake in the chain, said in a third-quarter earnings call this month that the deal was in part to blame for an $11 million operating loss.
Red Lobster hoped the promotion would bolster traffic at its U.S. locations through fall and winter, when its restaurants tend to be the emptiest.
Ultimate Endless Shrimp had already been a Red Lobster “guest-favorite” staple for over 18 years. But the restaurant took it a step further this summer, offering the previously seasonal deal “all day, every day” instead of just on Mondays.
Obviously, Red Lobster learned nothing from that one episode of The Simpsons.
Ludovic Garnier, the chief financial officer of Thai Union Group, indicated that the corporation was taken completely by surprise by the fact that offering people an unlimited amount of seafood for $20 negatively affected the profits of a restaurant that primarily sells seafood. (*Googles educational credentials needed to become a chief financial advisor*)
“But something which was different from our expectations is the proportion of the people selecting this promotion was much higher compared to expectation,” Garnier told investors earlier this month.
As for the future of the way-too-generous promotion, Garnier indicated that the company hasn’t decided to do away with it completely.
“It’s one of the iconic promotions for Red Lobster, so we want to keep it on the menu,” he said. “But, of course, we need to be much more careful regarding what is the entry point and what is the price point.”
-
Pages
