Monday, March 9, 2009

Cheesecake Factory Owns You

Posted by dholm on Mon, Mar 9, 2009 at 8:10 AM

click to enlarge cheesecake-factory.jpg

People go to Cheesecake Factory to wait.

It's a busy Friday or Saturday night and the idea of Cheesecake Factory sounds, well, luxurious. The people want to announce to all of their friends "I'm going to Cheesecake Factory (I must be fabulous)." The friends respond: "O,h you're going to Cheesecake Factory. You are so spectacular".

Cheesecake has done an unbelievable job at convincing people that their restaurant is something special and then taking it a step further to make them wait 2.6 hours in order to get in. It's amazing. How do they do it? Why are people waiting?

I'm not convinced; the last time I was there was about 2 years ago. Luckily for us, we have had a gift card since December and it was in desperate need of usage. I was determined not to wait a single minute so after careful research and thought I concluded that Saturday at 11:45am is the ideal time to avoid a wait.

I was wrong.

We had to wait 10 minutes. What is it about Cheesecake that even if there is a 10 minute wait it looks like it's packed? The hostesses in their high hostess tower with 14 computer screens control people's destiny and look down on you and try to get you to leave through angry eye contact.

We got seated in a nice booth and were greeted by an outstanding server. She brought us our drinks and left us alone to read the Cheesecake Factory menu book. Have you seen this thing? It's about 40 pages long, has all fine print text and awkward ads that get in the way of reading every description of their 1,598 menu items. They should change their name to Food Factory instead of Cheesecake Factory since they have every food on earth.

It took us awhile to decide what to eat. I wanted something I couldn't get anywhere else. The answer was Buffalo Blasts...chicken breast, cheese and spicy buffalo sauce all stuffed in a spicy wrapper and fried until crisp. Heaven....

This is like a boneless buffalo wing stuffed in a mini tortilla then deep fried. Quite possibly the most amazing thing I have ever tasted. I have never seen anything like this before. It is a genius invention!

Another reason that Cheesecake is genius is because you have to get dessert. You have no option. Would you dare visit a Cheesecake Factory and then not get cheesecake and risk being verbally and emotionally abused by the servers? I don't think so. You are sold that you're getting dessert before you even walk in the door. Cheesecake Factory owns every person that walks in for two reasons:

1. They can make you wait as long as they want.

2. You're getting dessert (no question).

The best part about lunch though after the deep fried goodness and the cheesecake was that we had a very nice booth location near the hostess tower and we could watch the 456 people all crammed inside eying our booth begging us to get up so they could sit down. It amazes me that at 1pm on a Saturday afternoon they were on at least an hour wait. Since so many people were waiting I decided to get drinks to go. This was just my attempt at trying to get back at Cheesecake Factory for making me wait for 10 minutes and then demanding I order dessert against my will.

Dan Holm writes the popular restaurant blog Green Eggs and Classy Eater - a revolutionary website with all kinds of restaurant deals and discounts.

Email him at danielrholm@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @danholm

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Comments (7)

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Does a *true* friend offer a gift card to an uber-chain, cattle-call restaurant? You might ask your people to support local businesses instead of a bastion of bland food...

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Posted by Taylor on March 9, 2009 at 9:18 AM

Taylor...I agree...there is nothing worse than getting a Gift Card for a restaurant you hate. I have even been known to "re-sell" gift cards to people who are willing to give me their cash in exchange.

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Posted by Dan Holm on March 9, 2009 at 9:24 AM

You know I am not a huge chain guy, at least not for the mediocre ones,(Roy`s and Fleming`s are chains) however I do like the factory. And you are right people will wait, amazing for a society of "gimme it now". I do like the cheesecakes, but I sometimes like the bar, they have great drink selections and rum from the homeland (Ten cane). These days I can`t justify waiting 2 hours for their food, but when Mom comes and she wants to go there, i oblige. it is one of the chains i can find something I can handle. That being said, I have not been there in a while, and I wonder now how I will find their food after all my wonderful trips to authentic ethnic joints around Tampa. When u eat in such places, it makes chain food really stand out as chain food

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Posted by rishi on March 9, 2009 at 3:21 PM

I think reason it's so popular is because it is the "food factory," and it doesn't totally suck, either. It's an easy restaurant to agree on.

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Posted by Kristen on March 9, 2009 at 11:21 PM

Rishi and Kristen: I agree with you both....it's not the "best place to eat" but for some reason it satisfies the "general public" because EVERYONE can find something to eat there. Maybe that's their strategy.....offer every type of entree on earth and then people won't have an excuse not to come...

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Posted by Dan Holm on March 10, 2009 at 9:39 AM

Yes, Taylor and Dan, Cheesecake Factory is incredibly popular and regularly has long waits to get in because it's horrible. Makes a lot of sense to me. Note to all my friends: Please give me Cheesecake Factory gift cards as presents. Sure, I go to many more "local" restaurants, but nothing beats the Factory!

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Posted by rick james on March 11, 2009 at 7:14 PM

rick james, The Cheesecake Factory's popularity and long waits are tributes to the banal American appetite. Next time you have an urge to go to the Cheesecake factory and gorge yourself on crappy fried foods and glutinous mediocre desserts, go to a farmers market instead. Try the one in downtown. *for the record, I could fill several large warehouses with "things that beat the Factory!"

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Posted by Thomas on March 13, 2009 at 10:40 PM
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