Did You know that Metromedia Restaurant Group owns

Did You know that Metromedia Restaurant Group owns Steak & Ale, Bennigan's, Bonanza, Ponderosa, and The Plano TAVERN.


http://www.metrogroup.com/.

I've never encountered a Plano Tavern. I certainly avoid the others.

I didn't know that Steak & Ale was still around. The last one I can recall shut down in the early 1970s here in central Ohio. I did eat there a couople of times. As I recall they had their menu on a cleaver and their waiters wanted to be your dearest friend. The food wasn't bad at all, but I couldn't take the cutesey-poo menus and there was no way I was going to adopt a waiter.

Garry, why do you care?

quote:

Originally posted by bill voss

Garry, why do you care?

I thought it was interesting, I see that two other people posted replys so I must not be the only person that found this interesting, and I an very, very sorry that I offended You!

Garry, you misunderstand. I figured there was some certain reason, good feeling, bad experiences, etc. that triggered the post. That's all. I just wanted to hear that story.
I apologize too! See ya.

I don't believe he was suggesting that he had taken offense. I'd guess he was curious as to what you thought of the restaurants owned by that company. I know I was curious about that.

It is a little interesting. While not mom&pops, we seem to assume that at least the chains are just restaurants that make clones of themselves. But it turns out to be much worse. They are in reality giant faceless corporations that crank out the same food but in different themes. Most of the chains are in these conglomerations. Somehow, we feel taken in by the scam. And by we, I mean people not usually including myself, who eat in chains. Krispy Kreme might have been somehow maybe ok before its IPO and for those that like Waffle House, it's still privately owned so maybe it's not really so bad. Just thinking out loud.

This gets me to wondering if there was a time any of these restaurants were valid independents or small chains.

quote:

Originally posted by wheregreggeats.com

This gets me to wondering if there was a time any of these restaurants were valid independents or small chains.

I think sometimes they were. The restaurant corporations can grow either by inventing "concepts" or by buying existing "brands". I can recall a time (1980 or so) when I rather liked Red Lobster, at least the one near me in Winter Park, FL which was wildly popular (always lines of people waiting to get in). At that time Red Lobster was not a publicly owned corporation because I looked into buying stock in it.

quote:

Originally posted by bill voss

Garry, you misunderstand. I figured there was some certain reason, good feeling, bad experiences, etc. that triggered the post. That's all. I just wanted to hear that story.
I apologize too! See ya.

I found it interesting that they were all owned by the same company, I knew companies like Smokey Bones, Red Lobster and the Olive Garden are all owned by the same company. I also knew that Ponderosa and Bonanza were opened by the same country but not all the other companies that are owned by Metromedia!

I was thinking, Oh My, these are national chains all owned by one company, no wonder people complain about chains, most chains are not that much different from another chain if they are owned by the same compnay.

I am sorry I took your question so wrong, I guess I am getting paranoid in my old age. LOL

Metromedia just opened a Plano Tavern in Southlake Tx., of course it's called Southlake Tavern.

quote:

Originally posted by BT

quote:

Originally posted by wheregreggeats.com

This gets me to wondering if there was a time any of these restaurants were valid independents or small chains.

I think sometimes they were. The restaurant corporations can grow either by inventing "concepts" or by buying existing "brands". I can recall a time (1980 or so) when I rather liked Red Lobster, at least the one near me in Winter Park, FL which was wildly popular (always lines of people waiting to get in). At that time Red Lobster was not a publicly owned corporation because I looked into buying stock in it.

And I remember in the early '80's how so many people in Ithaca complained that we could not draw a chain restaurant to the area (ironically, because of the number of small mom and pop shops that produced high quality, reasonably priced food...back then, still the glory days of the Moosewood restaurant). The chains' headquarters would always argue that the small population of the city would make their operations not profitable, but then, they would turn around and open up 30 miles away in smaller cities such as Elmira or Horseheads (Red Lobster did just this). Amazing, though, in a cosmopolitan university town will plenty of reasonably priced, good options to eat at, the populace still felt deprived if a corporate "fast casual" restaurant would not lay stakes in the area.
Update: Ithaca now has an Applebee's (packed at the predictable times), and a Chili's, that also does good business. No Red Lobster yet, but you can be sure that there are people clammoring for this.

quote:

Originally posted by tacchino

quote:

Originally posted by BT

quote:

Originally posted by wheregreggeats.com

This gets me to wondering if there was a time any of these restaurants were valid independents or small chains.

I think sometimes they were. The restaurant corporations can grow either by inventing "concepts" or by buying existing "brands". I can recall a time (1980 or so) when I rather liked Red Lobster, at least the one near me in Winter Park, FL which was wildly popular (always lines of people waiting to get in). At that time Red Lobster was not a publicly owned corporation because I looked into buying stock in it.

And I remember in the early '80's how so many people in Ithaca complained that we could not draw a chain restaurant to the area (ironically, because of the number of small mom and pop shops that produced high quality, reasonably priced food...back then, still the glory days of the Moosewood restaurant). The chains' headquarters would always argue that the small population of the city would make their operations not profitable, but then, they would turn around and open up 30 miles away in smaller cities such as Elmira or Horseheads (Red Lobster did just this). Amazing, though, in a cosmopolitan university town will plenty of reasonably priced, good options to eat at, the populace still felt deprived if a corporate "fast casual" restaurant would not lay stakes in the area.
Update: Ithaca now has an Applebee's (packed at the predictable times), and a Chili's, that also does good business. No Red Lobster yet, but you can be sure that there are people clammoring for this.

30 years ago, I would of love to seen a Red Lobster, open up in our town. But not today, the quality, taste and quanitly of the food at Red Lobster has dramically dropped!

I looked up the locations of Red Lobsters in Southwestern Michigan and North Centeral Indiana, the Five Red Lobsters that I looked up had approx 100,000 to 225,000 people whithin a 15 mile radus of the Red Lobstser. So, for that reason I think Red Lobster takes a very very hard look at a small town before they move in!!

quote:

Originally posted by tacchino

Amazing, though, in a cosmopolitan university town will plenty of reasonably priced, good options to eat at, the populace still felt deprived if a corporate "fast casual" restaurant would not lay stakes in the area.

I think this may really be the underlying reason in many cities. The greater Peoria area, which has Bradley University & Caterpillar world headquarters, is constantly competing with the greater Bloomington/Normal area, which has Illinois State University & State Farm Insurance headquarters. They are about 50 miles away from each other and they compete in all categories, since the populations are roughly identical. Bloomington had a Red Lobster about 5 years before Peoria and Peoria offered the franchisee all kinds of incentives until he finally opened one in Peoria. The same thing now is going on with Krispy Kreme. (Bloomington's opened last year and Peoria was scheduled for one this year until KK ran into financial trouble.) We don't have a TGIFriday yet, but Bloomington does. We have a Joe's Crab Shack and 2 Old Chicago Pizzas, and Bloomington/Normal (at this point) does not. Bloomington has 2 Culver's and the Peoria area has 4 of them. And on and on and on. Each city feels they are less than perfect if they can't offer the same name brands in restaurants and stores and hotels as their nearby rival, even though it is less than an hour's drive via Interstate between the two areas. Each one blames any decline in population on the fact that the other one has more "advantages" that are drawing people away, such as a slightly cheaper airfare to Las Vegas or Orlando, free parking at the airport, or "better" chain restaurants available.

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Hoffman

I didn't know that Steak & Ale was still around. The last one I can recall shut down in the early 1970s here in central Ohio. I did eat there a couople of times. As I recall they had their menu on a cleaver and their waiters wanted to be your dearest friend. The food wasn't bad at all, but I couldn't take the cutesey-poo menus and there was no way I was going to adopt a waiter.

I forgot about the cleaver menu! They don't have that anymore though. There is one on the south side of Indianapolis. What's funny (odd) is that back in the Seventies, Indy had one of those "blue laws," since changed, that a restaurant could not have any kind of booze in its name, so Steak and Ale was called the Jolly Ox.

quote:

Originally posted by tacchino

No Red Lobster yet, but you can be sure that there are people clammoring for this.

Will as far as I'm concerned, they can stop clamoring. I ate in one a few years ago and nearly gagged. Nothing like I remembered. That was my point, really. It was once private and decent. Now it's corporate and gaggogenic.

At last!! Someone who gets it!!--BT knows!--You dont EAT in cororate restaraunts--you INVEST in them!

quote:

Originally posted by tiki

At last!! Someone who gets it!!--BT knows!--You dont EAT in cororate restaraunts--you INVEST in them!

I still think chains were a lot better 25 to 30 years ago!

Maybe it's because there was a lot more Mom and Pop's to give the chains competition?

Maybe it's because the big corporate giants has bought the chains out?

But whatever the reason, the chains aren't as good as they used to be!

I have been hoping for the last 10 years people would get smart and go to the Mom and Pop's. But guess what, I have come to think that people don't go to the chains for the food. They go to the chains for entertainment, for drinking, for the great marketing the chains do and/or because the chains are close to malls, shopping Centers, sporting events, freeways and etc.

quote:

Originally posted by garryd451

people don't go to the chains for the food. They go to the chains for entertainment, for drinking, for the great marketing the chains do and/or because the chains are close to malls, shopping Centers, sporting events, freeways and etc.

Hey, we've beat this to death so many times, but I'll tell you why I go to chains:

(1) because in the little community south of Tucson where I spend the winter, all the good independent restaurants serve either Mexican food, down-home American food (think burgers, meatloaf, chicken-fried steak) or attempt fancier fare (think California/French) and don't pull it off very well by the standards I'm used to in the Bay Area. Sometimes I want something else. There is no independent pizza place (there's Domino's and Pizza Hut). There's no real deli (there's Schlotzky's but I hate their food so much I almost never go there). There's no BBQ (but I actually like the pork sandwiches at Dairy Queen or, if you put enough sauce on an Arby's, you can pretend). Of the 2 Chinese places, one is bad and the other mediocre and I'm just out of luck on that (except for TJ's frozen potstickers) until maybe they'll open a PF Chang's. There used to be a good hot dog place (had flourescent green relish, giardinaria from Chicago, the whole works and I ate there twice a week) that also sold meatball and Italian sausage subs but Subway put 'em out of business (I cried!) so now I have to eat at Subway since there's no independent sub shop;

(2) A few chains put the soda machine out where it's accessible for seconds and in the Southern AZ climate, a man can develop quite a thirst, so I go there to read my paper and suck down prodigious amounts of diet Coke.

quote:

Originally posted by BT

quote:

Originally posted by garryd451

people don't go to the chains for the food. They go to the chains for entertainment, for drinking, for the great marketing the chains do and/or because the chains are close to malls, shopping Centers, sporting events, freeways and etc.

Hey, we've beat this to death so many times, but I'll tell you why I go to chains:

(1) because in the little community south of Tucson where I spend the winter, all the good independent restaurants serve either Mexican food, down-home American food (think burgers, meatloaf, chicken-fried steak) or attempt fancier fare (think California/French) and don't pull it off very well by the standards I'm used to in the Bay Area. Sometimes I want something else. There is no independent pizza place (there's Domino's and Pizza Hut). There's no real deli (there's Schlotzky's but I hate their food so much I almost never go there). There's no BBQ (but I actually like the pork sandwiches at Dairy Queen or, if you put enough sauce on an Arby's, you can pretend). Of the 2 Chinese places, one is bad and the other mediocre and I'm just out of luck on that (except for TJ's frozen potstickers) until maybe they'll open a PF Chang's. There used to be a good hot dog place (had flourescent green relish, giardinaria from Chicago, the whole works and I ate there twice a week) that also sold meatball and Italian sausage subs but Subway put 'em out of business (I cried!) so now I have to eat at Subway since there's no independent sub shop;

(2) A few chains put the soda machine out where it's accessible for seconds and in the Southern AZ climate, a man can develop quite a thirst, so I go there to read my paper and suck down prodigious amounts of diet Coke.

I do understand why You go to chains, but I am talking about the average consumer. You have real special circumstances involved into why You eat at chains.

I know that here in, Northern Indiana and Southwestern Michigan, There are alot of Mom and Pop's places that serves outstanding pizza, Bar-b-que, Mexican food and just good old USA food. But the majority of people go for the reasons I have mentioned in the above posts.

Fellow Readers, how many times do You go to the chains not because you want to but because a friend, one of your Children, one of your Grandchilden and/or a neighbor that You were going to dine out with wanted to go there. And I bet that person wanted to go there for one of the above reasons I mentioned.

The average American Consumer are really influenced by the Corporate Marketing and Advertising that these chains uses!

And we shouldn't overlook the perceived safety factor involved in the homogeneity of foods offered by the chains. There is definitely an element of "trust" that has built up (whether we like it or not), and customers may be even more reluctant nowadays to risk dining dollars on non-chain food that either could be good or not, or may not have the types of food on the menu that will appeal to everyone in their group. You may not even be able to trust reviews of Mom and Pop places that are more than a year old; management changes, cooks leave, and this has a proportionately much greater effect on the Mom and Pop's than on the chains.

I remember time spent working in Rome, and was amazed that the two McDonald's outlets could even get one customer, much less be crowded day in and day out (and there is at least another outlet in that city now!). But it provides a standardized product that appeals to people who want consistent standards of cleanliness (read sterility) in the environment, and comforting blandness in the food. Oh well, at least in Rome's McDonald's they offer a delicious-looking dessert bar, along with wine and beer on the menu! At least some individuality comes through.

quote:

Originally posted by tacchino

And we shouldn't overlook the perceived safety factor involved in the homogeneity of foods offered by the chains. There is definitely an element of "trust" that has built up (whether we like it or not), and customers may be even more reluctant nowadays to risk dining dollars on non-chain food that either could be good or not, or may not have the types of food on the menu that will appeal to everyone in their group. You may not even be able to trust reviews of Mom and Pop places that are more than a year old; management changes, cooks leave, and this has a proportionately much greater effect on the Mom and Pop's than on the chains.

You make some very good points, that I didn't think of!


I remember time spent working in Rome, and was amazed that the two McDonald's outlets could even get one customer, much less be crowded day in and day out (and there is at least another outlet in that city now!). But it provides a standardized product that appeals to people who want consistent standards of cleanliness (read sterility) in the environment, and comforting blandness in the food. Oh well, at least in Rome's McDonald's they offer a delicious-looking dessert bar, along with wine and beer on the menu! At least some individuality comes through.

quote:

Originally posted by garryd451

quote:

Originally posted by bill voss

Garry, why do you care?

I thought it was interesting, I see that two other people posted replys so I must not be the only person that found this interesting, and I an very, very sorry that I offended You!

GarryD451, for the record I also find the topic interesting. Ponderosa started out in the Dayton area and has since reestablished itself in Texas.

I ate at a Bonanza the other night because it was close and fast. I actually had a decent ribeye steak cooked how I like it and the salad bar and hot bar was clean and frequently refreshed. I'd go again.

MikeS.