Robb Report: Coronavirus Threw Restaurants a Devastating Curveball. An Uncertain Future Lies Ahead

Stock photo Jay Wennington

Aug. 19, 2020

Since the outbreak of Covid-19 earlier this spring, Seattle fine-dining institution Canlis has scrambled to reinvent itself about a half-dozen times. First there were to-go meals, a breakfast bagel shed and the drive-through burger concept, which became a victim of its own success when it began causing traffic jams in the neighborhood and had to be scrapped. Then came a drive-in movie theater. Then an outdoor crab shack.

Chicago’s Alinea followed suit, nimbly shifting to producing hundreds of gourmet meal kits per night and opening a rooftop pop-up called Alinea in Residence (AIR for short). Pivots like these have offset the current chaos, for now. But even from some of the most influential trailblazers in American fine dining, questions about the future are met with genuine uncertainty.

“I no longer have a long-term strategy,” says Alinea co-owner and restaurateur Nick Kokonas. “We are generally on a week-to-week, month-to-month basis.”

Read more at https://robbreport.com/food-drink/dining/fine-dining-survive-covid-2944313/