Home / Looking back to move forward: Association shares top 10 trends for 2021
After the devastation of 2020, we assess the state of our industry and offer a sampling of trends shaping businesses this year.
For so many, 2020 was a year of fear and uncertainty as the coronavirus ravaged the country and put the restaurant industry through its worst year in history. The economy came to a halt as millions of Americans sheltered in place, and businesses were forced to close indoor spaces.
About 110,000 restaurants across the nation fell victim to dining restrictions imposed due to the pandemic, closing either temporarily or for good.
According to Association research, the industry lost some $240 billion in sales and is still 2.5 million jobs below pre-pandemic levels.
Nevertheless, restaurateurs persevere. By quickly switching to all off-premises service, innovating operations, and adapting contactless technology, they continue to show resiliency, doing everything they can to keep their businesses open and employees on the payroll.
Some restaurants converted closed dining rooms into grocery store staging areas so that customers could pick up supermarket staples and hard-to-get supplies along with their restaurant orders. Working through a different supply chain, operators often had access to supplies grocery stores couldn’t keep in stock.
Technology that might have been “nice to have” before the pandemic suddenly became “need to have” to enable touchless transactions.
Alcohol-to-go service became a best-selling option for many struggling restaurants as many state and local jurisdictions temporarily stayed regulations that prohibited the sale.
Many of the innovations deployed not only helped keep restaurants afloat in 2020, they also signal the trends shaping 2021.
We now know that three things are certain: the pandemic tested the limits of operator creativity and knowhow, accelerated tech adoption and emerging trends, and confirmed that customers sorely miss their restaurant experiences.
As the Association prepares to release its new State of the Restaurant Industry report, based on survey results from 6,000 operators (and featuring customer preferences from a survey of 1,000 adult consumers), we’re sharing the top 10 restaurant trends that helped restaurants survive and serve as a sign of things to come.
If you’re wondering about what foods customers craved most, we ask operators to name their No. 1 selling item right now and 6,000 of them told us. Here are the top sellers from fullservice and limited service restaurants.
Association and WWF’s 86 Food Waste delivers the small steps that lead to big reductions in how much you throw out.
Bloomin’ Brands, Tampa Bay, Fla., launches a delivery-only virtual brand called Tender Shack and grows it to 750 outlets.
Industry experts look at sustainability and sourcing more than a year since COVID-19’s onset.
Homestyle cooking and comfort food thrives off-premises, while updated technology makes ordering seamless.