By Howard Fischer | Capitol Media Services via PinalCentral
Customers aren’t exactly filling the places up.
But new figures from OpenTable suggest that Arizonans are once again warming to the idea of dining out — and doing so with more exuberance than much of the rest of the country.
The most recent data from the organization that help people book reservations finds that dine-in seating at the restaurants surveyed is down about 60 percent from the same time a year ago.
That’s not great. But it comes after weeks of no in-house dining following the March 20 order from Doug Ducey allowing restaurants to provide only curbside and take-out service. It took until May 11 for the governor to partly lift the order, allowing dine-in services with new service protocols and limits on numbers of diners.
And that 60 percent reduction is better than most of the rest of the country, where dine-in service, on average, is still about 87 percent below last year. Steve Chucri, president of the Arizona Restaurant Association, said it appears that only South Carolina and Alabama, among states that shuttered restaurants, are doing better.
What’s keeping the numbers from being better?
