All The Restaurants That Are Closing Locations This Year
Over the course of two days in 2019, 45 Boston Market locations closed their doors forever. That number represented about 10% of the chain’s more than 450 total locations. The move was part of what the company called a “multi-faceted transformation plan,” meaning more changes will likely be incoming. The sudden closures followed a period of aggressive expansion in 2016 and 2017.
This comfort food chain, which originated in Florida in 1992, has seen its fan base grow and its empire bloom to more than 50 locations in the past few years. However, the company has already had to nix a few struggling restaurants in the new decade. On the first weekend of January 2020, it was announced that Metro Diner had suddenly closed both of its locations in Las Vegas. There’s been no word yet on whether more closures are expected.
The Mexican fast-casual chain Taco Cabana already closed a good number of locations in the early part of the new year. The company is based in Texas, and that’s the state where it suddenly shuttered 19 restaurants on Jan. 13. The closures hit Taco Cabanas in Austin, Dallas, Houston and San Antonio, taking the company’s total down to 145 locations. The decision was reportedly made following losses of several million dollars.
When you’ve got a chain as massive as Subway, some closures are expected every year. But, in 2019, the company closed more than 1,000 locations, marking a decent decline from its mammoth number of locations of about 24,000 in America. As of the early days of 2020, the chain had already shuttered several locations in Pennsylvania and more are expected as it tries to grow profits.
You can always count on some Starbucks locations to close in any given year, which is simply a fact of life when you operate nearly 30,000 cafes worldwide. In 2019, the chain closed a reported 150 locations based on underperforming sales and we know of at least two stores (on in Washington, the other in California) that have closed in 2020. Of course, you can expect plenty of new Starbucks cafes to open this year as well, including some of the 100 “community stores” the coffee giant wants to open in partnership with United Way in low-income neighborhoods by 2025.
This casual-dining powerhouse has been reducing its numbers in the past few years, and there’s no reason to think that trend won’t continue in 2020. Over the past two years, Applebee’s has eliminated 110 restaurants from its empire, which still leaves it with more than 1,800 locations. In 2019, the company estimated that it should close about 20 stores per year starting this year, though that will be balanced out by new stores that will open.
If you live in Pennsylvania, you’ll probably know about Primanti Bros. The Pittsburgh-based sandwich shop chain has at least 25 restaurants spread across several states. The chain has already shrunken its portfolio a bit in 2020, closing two locations in Indianapolis in January; another had closed in 2019. That city had four Primanti Bros. restaurants in early 2019 but is now down to just one.
The chain started a rash of closings that began in 2019 and is expected to continue into this year. According to MoneyPop, the company announced it would close underperforming locations across 2019 and 2020. In January, Nation’s Restaurant News reported that Friday’s would shut down at least two more locations, both located inside California malls, in 2020.
This is another chain that has yet to officially announce closures for 2020, but given the news in recent months, it’s tough to imagine more closures aren’t coming soon. Red Robin closed at least 10 locations in 2019 before announcing in November that they’d hired a new CEO, Paul Murphy. They also announced in November that sales and traffic had slipped slightly in 2019. Murphy quickly closed underperforming locations when he was an executive at Noodles & Co. in 2017, so it’s likely his tenure at the top of Red Robin will follow that tactic.
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