Restaurant closure rate drops a bit

The rash of restaurants that closed across Upstate New York last year is nothing out of the ordinary.

A slack economy or not, a large chunk of the restaurant comminity goes belly-up every year.

The good news is that the number of U.S. restaurants closures slowed last fall, an improvement over the spring 2009 numbers.

That is according to The NPD Group's ReCount data released Wednesday. It says the total number of U.S. restaurants declined 0.3% (1,652 locations) to 578,353 locations in the fall of 2009, compared with the fall of 2008. ReCount tracks commercial restaurant locations every spring and fall.

"NPD's fall 2009 ReCount reflects a slowdown in chains expanding, and two years of a challenging economy already weeding out the poorest performing restaurants," said Greg Starzynski, NPD's director of product development for foodservice.

The number of full-service restaurants -- including casual, family and fine-dining businesses -- shrunk 0.3% in the fall of 2009, compared with a year ago. In the same period, the number of quick-service restaurant locations declined by 0.2%.

Other findings of the survey:

• Regionally, the Central part of the United States, which includes Michigan, Ohio and Illinois, saw the most restaurants close, with a 1.2-percent drop in the number of locations. The Northeast region, which includes Upstate New York, was relatively hard hit, with a 0.6% drop in restaurants.

• Growth at major chains or those with at least 500 locations remained flat in both quick-service and full-service segments.

• Full service restaurants belonging to mid-sized chains, or those with 100 to 499 locations, had the largest declines, down 2% percent from a year ago.

• Independent quick-service restaurants and smaller QSR chains experienced each posted a 2% drop in total unit counts.