Adweek: Younger Consumers Are Abandoning Casual Chains. Here’s What Restaurants Are Doing to Fix It

There’s a trend that’s been negatively impacting the restaurant segment of the franchising industry—millennials and Gen Z consumers have been ditching casual, legacy chains. A recent article in Adweek notes that brands like Applebee’s are closing locations and citing a drop in foot traffic as a major reason why. That’s why chains in this category are re-thinking their images and rolling out new marketing initiatives.

One example of this is IHOP. In order to attract the younger generations of American consumers, the brand took the time to ensure that it’s delivery and to-go processes were just right and up to par with today’s technology standards. In an interview with Adweek, Brad Haley, IHOP’s brand marketing chief, said, “We wanted to make sure we could deliver the food in a way we knew our guests would want it. We spent a lot of time working on our packaging. That was one of those offline things we needed to do to make sure the technology would work as well as it possibly could.”

Other brands that are finding ways to integrate technology and innovation into their concepts are TGI Fridays, Olive Garden and Red Lobster.

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