Iconic chicken chain on life support after closing more than 1,000 restaurants
Iconic chicken chain on life support after closing more than 1,000 restaurants
Americans love to eat chicken, and there are plenty of fast-food options for those looking for their fix.
Popeyes, Chick-fil-A, KFC, Raising Cane’s, Church’s … again, it’s not hard to find chicken. But one restaurant you just don’t hear mentioned in that discussion much anymore is Boston Market.
That might have something to do with the old, “Out of sight, out of mind,” saying because it is not easy to find a Boston Market these days. The restaurant, which began as Boston Chicken in 1985, and is headquartered in Newtown Township, Pennsylvania, had more than 1,200 restaurants at one point in the 1990s, according to The Street.
But the bottom fell out over the next couple of decades.
Boston Market was down to 300 stores heading into 2023, and The Street said that it shrank to fewer than 30 locations by the start of 2024. The Boston Market Wikipedia page says it currently has 22 stores left, but The Street said the actual number could be less than 20.
The outlet cited a report from Nation’s Restaurant News in 2023 that claimed that Boston Market owner Jay Pandya faced “hundreds of lawsuits from vendors, franchisors, and employees regarding unpaid bills” when he filed for bankruptcy on Dec. 8, 2023.
At the time, per the report, he cited $10-$50 million in liabilities.
But, The Street reported, that filing by Pandya and another attempt were each rejected by the courts.
So, what happened to Boston Market and its delicious rotisserie chickens to call such a fall off?
Restaurant analyst Aaron Allen told FCNews that the chain hurt itself “by holding its costs down — a move that ultimately led to a reduction in quality, which only undercut it further.”
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Also, a big issue for Boston Market, per The Street’s report, was the fact that grocery stores began offering rotisserie chickens.
“The chain eventually saw the likes of Costco serve up the same things far cheaper,” retail and restaurant expert Steve Feldman reportedly said.
And, because of that, it might be hard for Boston Market to pull itself back off life support.
Read the original article on pennlive.com.
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