Shoney's Rolls Out New Prototype

Photo: Pointnshoot, Flickr

Shoney's is hoping a new restaurant prototype it premiered last week in the city where the family-dining franchise got its start will mark a rebirth for the beleaguered chain.

The revamped flagship eatery in Charleston, W. Va., features a new skillet-driven menu -- "we have breakfast skillets, pot-roast skillets and an apple pie skillet for dessert," boasts ShoRest marketing director Denise Biafore -- with a new orange-and-avocado color scheme and new decorations, including live plants.

"We're taking it back to its glory days," Biafore says. "A lot of people think Shoney's is a dying chain."

Those people may have been monitoring Shoney's vital signs, all of which have lately been rather alarming. As the Wall Street Journal reported last month in a story documenting the once-strapping restaurant's decline, the chain has shed 700 of its 1,000 locations and lags far behind its closest competitors in market share.

"Twenty years ago, you didn't have Ryan's and Golden Corral and IHOP and Cracker Barrel," Biafore says, reeling off her rival list.

According to Biafore, Shoney's failed to "move with the times," and was pigeonholed by diners as a senior citizens' social hall. Younger customers, like Biafore's daughter, gravitated toward casual chains like Ruby Tuesday and Outback Steakhouse. Biafore says Shoney's new menu, which includes salmon and bacon-wrapped sirloin, was designed partly to target the millennium generation's tastes.

"You do need to appeal to the 18-to-25 year olds," Biafore says.

Bob Evans, which has stuck to a similar comfort food strategy, last month made a play for contemporary eaters with a new "Home of Homestyle" concept that includes flat-screen televisions, free wi-fi and a communal "Bob's Table."

Shoney's restaurants across the country will gradually be remodeled in accordance with the Charleston template. Biafore, who describes herself as an "old Shoney's diehard," is confident the breezier decor and more cosmopolitan menu can save the chain.

"I believe this will put us back where we belong," she says.