Red Robin Restaurants say Business is Mostly the Same as this Time Last Year

Red Robin restaurants; America's gourmet burger maker, were revisited by our researchers this month. Tickermine consulted 30 restaurants around the country and asked whether lunch or dinner were busiest, what the respondents thought attracted their customers to their location, whether the location was new (i.e. less than a year old), was a similar restaurant to Red Robin nearby, what was the average check for a party of two and what were their customer's favorite menu items? Dinner remains busiest, over lunch, but at a higher percentage this month. 57% of those polled chose dinner, and 43% chose lunch. Fewer respondents reported that the location was new this poll. Only two people or 7% said their restaurant was less than a year old. 93% said their restaurant was older than a year. 53% of those polled said it was the atmosphere at Red Robin that attracted their customers. 20% said it was the prices and 27% said it was the menu. (This changed from our last survey where 60% felt it was the menu that their customers liked best.) 43% of our respondents said a party of two spends less than $25. Another 43% cited between $30-$40 and 13% cited between $40-$45. (This has gone up since our previous survey when most respondents said a party of two spends between $21-$30.) 67% of those interviewed reported heading nearby competition and cited the Elephant Bar, Fuddruckers and Red Lobster as some of their competing chains. 33% reported having no nearby restaurants. The hamburgers were the most popular menu item in the survey (73% of those polled), followed by the Prime Rib Dip and the Apple Harvest chicken salad (each were mentioned by 10% of those polled). The Endless Fries and the Crispy Chicken Burger were also mentioned (3% each). Most respondents or 63% of those interviewed said business was the same as this time last year. (This differs to our last survey where most (52%) thought business was busier.) This survey, only 20% reported business being up from last year, and 10% felt that business had dropped. 

62% of Starwood's Luxury Hotels and Resorts See Steady Business, In Spite of the Economy

The Luxury Collection Starwood Hotels and Resorts is a small but gorgeous five-star hotel chain in the US with only 11 locations, including the Phoenician in Scottsdale, AZ the Palace hotel in San Francisco, and the Atlantic Resort in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Tickermine surveyed eight of the locations this month asking about their room sizes, the cost of their standard rooms, had business slowed at all as a result of the economy, and whether they thought the rate of the standard rooms would increase in the next month? We also asked about hotel size. Four of those polled or 50% said their hotel contains less than 200 rooms.