In the United States the trend towards eating out, as opposed to making meals at home, has been on a steady upwards trajectory for more than a century. The arrival of the car and the interstate highway system made us more mobile and fast food restaurants increased greatly our opportunities to “grab a bite on the road.” In 1950 American’s spent approximately 24% of their food budget on food eaten away from home. In 2010 that percentage had doubled, to 48%.

Today’s market size is the estimated sales revenue at full-service restaurants in the United States in 2010. This does not include fast food restaurants, catered affairs or even specialty food services like the cafeterias set up in office buildings or other institutional settings, nor such things as food carts that sell from the street or park or parking lot. Full-service restaurants are those that provide a meal to customers who come to sit down and be served a meal.

Geographic reference: United States
Year: 2009
Market size: $195.35 billion
Source: “Estimated Annual Sales of U.S. Retail and Food Services Firms by Kind of Business: 1992 Through 2009,” Annual Retail Trade Survey, March 31, 2011, a PDF version of the table is available here.
Original source: U.S. Census Bureau [a wonderful and important part of the U.S. Department of Commerce that, due to funding cutbacks, is in the process of eliminating some of their valuable services. We are sorry to see them go and we sincerely hope that the cutbacks will not in any way reach the core data collection work done in the Economic Census program itself or the eqaully crucial sector-based annual surveys that so carefully track economic activity by sector—Annual Survey of Manufactures; Service Annual Survey; Annual Retail Trade Survey; Annual Wholesale Trade Survey, etc…].
Posted on November 9, 2011