Restaurant Sales – MN – January 2020

Slow January for the Twin Cities

While it was not an upbeat start for restaurants in the Twin Cities, with year over year sales down -5.32%, January’s performance fell around the middle of the pack for the past 12 months. The trend underscores the area’s dining slowdown, which played out for most of the past year. One bright note was New Year’s Day, which saw a nice sales increase of 4.06% compared to New Year’s Day 2019.

Some experts see slowing growth as an inevitable outcome of earlier aggressive restaurant expansion (nationally, the number of restaurants per 100,000 people grew from 165.1 to 189.8 from 2001 to 2016). Consulting firm BDO recently asked restaurant CFOs what they expect over the next few years – 70% anticipate a recession in 2021 or 2022, although most don’t expect to see a drop in revenue this coming year.

About these metrics: The MarginEdge monthly snapshot of Minneapolis/St. Paul restaurant sales is based on a sampling of 45 area restaurants ranging from fast-casual to full-service.