INFOGRAPHIC: Sports Bars are Showing Women’s Sports but There’s Room for Growth
The US takes on France in the Women’s World Cup quarterfinals today, and we’re sure most (if not all) sports bars will be showing the game on their TVs. Not only is it a big, international game, but according to a Nielsen research study, 84% of sports fans are interested in watching women’s sports. And half of that group includes men. But are sports bars taking advantage of that fandom? We polled you all to find out that answer.
DID YOU KNOWS…
Gotta Catch ‘Em All!
A Pokemon-inspired pop-up bar is on its to Brooklyn, NY this fall. For almost all of November, Pokemon fans can hit up the PokeBar to munch on some Pikachu, Charmander and Squirtle burgers, Pokemon-themed drinks, a live DJ, costume contest, and trivia. The bar will also be set up as a Pokemon Go obstacle course.
US Economic Expansion Continues
“If the United States makes it past July 1 without a recession, the current economic recovery will turn out to have been the longest in American history”, James Poterba, MIT professor and President of the National Bureau of Economic Research, said in an interview with the New York Times earlier this month. But while the probability of July marking the 121st month of what would then be the longest expansion in history is high, we’ll have to wait a couple of months for the Business Cycle Dating Committee to review all relevant data until we can pop the champagne.
Is Insect Protein the Next “Fake Meat?”
There’s been a lot of talk of how damaging to the environment our traditional meat-eating practices are. It’s led to the rise of Impossible Food and Beyond Meat growing in popularity. But what about insect protein? Sound gross? It’s currently poised to become an $8 billion market by 2030. At the moment, about 2 billion people in more than 113 countries eat insects and have seen a small rise to edible insect companies.
CHIPOTLE, AT IT AGAIN :)
Why it matters to you: With a new employee incentive program, has Chipotle cracked the staff retention code?
Having used Chipotle as a punching bag these past three years, you can imagine our surprise when the burrito giant actually made a headline that wasn’t about someone getting sick at their restaurants. In fact, better than not getting anyone sick, Chipotle is experimenting with empowering their hourly employees to care about the bottom line. In a notoriously difficult segment to staff (fast food) and with a famously recalcitrant generation (Gen Z) as their main source of staffing, Chipotle determined that they could stem their turnover trouble by providing bonuses to their hourly employees for solid sales and cash flow results.
Mark us as among the folks that think this is a brilliant idea. For too long, our entire industry has ignored the role played by hourlies in our profit and focused on the managers for bonus potential. With poor turnover results (145%) and facing difficulty finding the best candidates, Chipotle now has the ability to offer quarterly bonuses for folks that are employed straight through. While no one can project whether this program will deliver results, intuitively when you connect people to a goal that is attainable and financially lucrative, they will work hard to achieve it. No matter the outcome, this has the potential to change the paradigm for restaurants and we are eagerly awaiting the results.
[Source: Nation’s Restaurant News]
THAT’S NOT ON MY DIET
Why it matters to you: Swing-state voters reject need for more nutritional info at restaurants.
With a consequential national election on the horizon, it’s easy to lose sight of the more granular electoral issues our country is facing in 2020. While Presidential politics dominate the news cycle, there are real-world issues being decided in swing state across the U.S. Among the most prominent is the fight over restaurants disclosing nutritional information on their menus. A rule that went into force in May of 2018 requires that restaurants with more than 50 outlets to list a variety of nutritional data points on their menus. These include calories and sodium. It’s the latter that is sparking some significant debate in states like Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. Ironically, it’s the electorate that is against the increased regulation for chain restaurant operators with many decrying the additional regulation and concerned it might increase prices for consumers.
It’s an old trope that everyone is a liberal until you ask them to pay for something. Polling shows opposition outstripping support for the expansion of menu labeling by an average of 7% in all three of the aforementioned swing states. If we had to project why folks are generally not interested in the additional nutritional data, likely it’s the fact that people escape those concerns when they visit a restaurant. It’s a quirky way to shame people into eating healthy by forcing them to confront their choices. I don’t know about you, but I don’t really want the government to determine when I should feel guilty about my eating habits. It appears, at least in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania residents agree with me.
[Source: Restaurant Business Online]
