Whatever Happened To The Mr Steak Restaurant Chain?
On the list of experts' red flags to watch for when eating at a steakhouse, we can't be too sure if Mr. Steak committed any common infractions. The last holdout of what was once a 285-location business in the United States and Canada closed in St. Charles, Missouri in 2009, at the tail end of the Great Recession. Economics definitely played a factor in the doom of this once-thriving restaurant family, which never got a chance to be ranked on our list of popular steakhouse chains, but out-of-control diversification played a role as well.
Social media anecdotes and internet retrospectives remember Mr. Steak as a chain that encouraged families to come together — the type that three generations might all enjoy en famille for an anniversary celebration or a big birthday. Indeed, in the 1980s, Mr. Steak put itself on the map by offering a free steak dinner on birthdays. Of course, it was already pretty economical to start with. Nobody was claiming that Mr. Steak would win any awards for the juiciness or quality of its beef, but it was a cheap place to have a nice meal.
Unfortunately, two disasters befell Mr. Steak over time: leadership decided to branch out away from the winning combo of steaks and sides and venture into what was arguably too much variety, including chicken, seafood, dinner salads, and so forth; and the company became enmeshed in a large amount of debt that it couldn't pay back. Mr. Steak's parent company filed for bankruptcy in 1988, and the chain died a gradual death.
What was Mr. Steak like back in the day?
"[Mr. Steak] had great salads and mini loaves of bread served on a cutting board that you sliced yourself," one Redditor reminisced wistfully. There really must have been something about that complimentary bread, as another commenter sighed, "I still have cravings for that bread! Never found anything that tasted half that good." It's little wonder that adults of a certain age remember eating at Mr. Steak as children, because the chain catered hard to families with tykes. Juvenile diners were treated to paper cow masks — in a disturbing revelation, it seems that the eponymous "Mr. Steak" was a bovine — and kids' meals with fairy tale-inspired names. As an additional nod to family values, the restaurant didn't serve alcohol. In Facebook comments, one former diner remembered that the waitstaff were trained to bring children's dinners out first so that parents could get them eating and happy before their own entrées arrived.
What happy families didn't see behind the facade of Mr. Steak, however, was the lack of sound financial savvy. Most locations were franchises, and not all the leases on those franchises were smart decisions. The shifting executive board couldn't agree on which direction to steer the ship, and that indecision and ambivalence ultimately amounted to the end of the steakhouse. Today, Mr. Steak is a hazy memory, and, sadly, there's not really a nationwide equivalent in the field of affordable steak in North America.