Get the kids to the diner

Category: In the Trenches

Published on Friday, 17 August 2012 08:31

Written by Randy Garbin

SouthCoastToday.com just posted a bit-too-late story about the closing of Al Mac's Diner in Fall River, Massachusetts. While we all know by now of the diner's demise, the article contained this juicy little nugget:

As time marched on, the diner lost more and more of its most faithful patrons, Gauthier said.

"We have some loyal customers, but every time there's an obituary in the paper, there goes another," Gauthier said. "I don't know what next month brings."

This comment points to a serious problem facing all-too-many diners, old and new, across the country: Their  aging clientele. If any long-running restaurant forgets how to cater to and attract younger customers, then they number their days. Where do Millenials and Gen-Xers go to eat these days? Are they looking for heaping piles of meat loaf? Maybe they are, but maybe they'd like fresher, more natural alternatives. Maybe they want an espresso. 

Or maybe, especially in the case of Fall River, the ethnic makeup of the surrounding neighborhoods changed, and with that, their culinary preferences. When this happens, diners would do well to consider the example of the Route 66 Diner in Springfield, Massachusetts. When Norm and Don Roy took over the 1957 Mountain View, their diner largely served a white, blue collar clientele that worked in the surrounding factories. When the factories and the white clientele left the area, the neighborhood became predominately African-American. For a time, the Roys struggled. In 1992, they called Roadside looking for help selling out. 

Then Norm Roy, who left the diner for a while, came back, looked around, and realized that the business could only grow again if they marketed it to the neighborhood. White suburbanites were not going to drive back into that part of Springfield just for breakfast. Norm placed ads in the neighborhood shopper magazines and included new menu items favored by African-Americans. Business started to grow again, and today, the Route 66 welcomes and serves a broader market. The diner is as busy as it ever was, and Don Roy has begun restoration work that will leave it with a fresh stainless skin. 

The day the diner stopped innovating is the day the diner starts to die. Historically, diners prospered because the industry strove to stay in the forefront of the market. I am in no way questioning the work ethic of the Gauthiers. They outlasted the averages and they proved good stewards of a national landmark. 

But the nature of the restaurant industry demands constant innovation and tireless attention to what the corporate world would call market research. When your regulars start to die off, and you have no plan to replace them, you can expect your business to follow them into the grave.