Red Lobsterhas revivedits 'Endless Shrimp' promotion at prices up to 50% higher than before, a gamble arriving less than two years after the all-you-can-eat offer pushed the US seafood chain into Chapter 11 bankruptcy and closed more than 130 restaurants.
When the CEO announces ENDLESS SHRIMP IS BACK (for a limited time only) … you listen.#endless#shrimp#scampi
The limited-run deal, which returned to dine-in menus on 20 April, is priced between $24.99 (£18.52) and $29.99 (£22.23) per person, depending on location, up from $20 (£14.82) in 2024. Five dishes are included, among them a new 'Marry Me Shrimp' tomato-cream recipe.
Behind the fanfare, former employees say the economics do not work for anyone on the floor. Saul Eugene, who waited tables at Red Lobster in 2019 and 2020, toldBusiness Insiderthat diners routinely 'sit there and eat shrimp for two and a half hours,' turning a single check into 'essentially a 22-course meal'. He called the stretch 'hell for servers' and 'the time when the most staff quits.'
Current and former staff posting on theRed Lobster subredditecho that view, describing tables that tip on the low menu price rather than the hours spent, attempting to smuggle shrimp home in unauthorised to-go boxes, and occasionally eating until they vomit before ordering more.
One user postingas a server wrote that refill after refill for hours typically ends in a $5 (£3.71) tip, if any tip is left.
A former senior communications executive toldBusiness Insiderthe promotion was originally engineered as a footfall play rather than a shrimp push. Marketing would 'shout from the rooftops' about the deal externally while staff steered diners toward higher-margin mains such as lobster.
The offer is now advertised 'big and bold' across menus, she said, which risks cannibalising the Orlando-based company's Lobsterfest window, a period the executive said has generated up to 20% to 35% of annual revenue.
The shift lands right before Red Lobster's fiscal year-end in May, a window when margins matter most. It also revives a structural problem.
When Thai seafood giant Thai Union Group owned the chain between 2016 and 2024, restaurants were required to buy shrimp from the parent company at above-market rates. That arrangement, combined with demand surging far beyond forecasts, contributed to an $11 million (£8.15million) operating loss tied to Endless Shrimp in 2023, according to Thai Union's then-chief financial officer Ludovic Garnier.
Source: International Business Times UK
