Soulless, bland, and alarmingly expensive chain restaurants have taken over the modern dining experience. They cheat out homegrown mom-and-pop restaurants with their big-britches financial backers, their coupon-coded marketing schemes, and remarkably potent long island ice teas. Boomers and Gen X are seeking comfort in restaurant conformity, perpetuating the mega-chain dinner model by prioritizing predictability, familiarity, and mediocrity.
Bottomless breadsticks stick to the inside of their mouth as they peruse a 24″ accordion menu with 55 dishes from 14 different countries. Before ever ordering a thing, they already know that the chicken penne alfredo is a microwaved TV dinner and the cheesecake dessert is freshly thawed from the freezer. Consequently, this trend is putting grandma’s secret recipe to rest because no matter how hard they work or how good their food is, small, family-run restaurants can’t compete with the copy/paste corporate giants and their super snazzy Dollaritas.
