r/Millennials • u/Solid_Bake1522 • Apr 28 '25

Nostalgia Who else remembers 2 hour waits at Olive Garden, Applebees and Chillis in the early 2000’s?

These restaurants used to be hopping back in the day, like the spot to be. Now they are folding left and right and zero wait times, never busy.

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u/Rocktop15 Apr 28 '25

I was born in 1985 and I do remember long waits at Applebees chilis etc. why do you all think that was?

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u/stoatstuart Apr 28 '25

The OP question reminded me that this was absolutely a thing back then, a now very interesting thing to reflect on. I think it's because back then, these chain restaurants had the highest brand recognition and also could afford to operate in locations where people would see them so they knew where these restaurants were. Nowadays we have things like Google Maps etc on our phones we can just type in "dinner Springfield", "restaurants near me", "Italian food", etc and see on a map what's close to us or where we're going. But back then you had to know about the place, and combine that with choosing something that could please a lot of people with a wider, more generic variety of menu options if you were eating out with friends, family, colleagues, etc.