Where there were predecessor concepts, during the 1990's the theme restaurant and club era swept the world, and in particular the U.S., with most retail developers looking at themed restaurants and themed clubs as a way to increase the consumer appeal of retail facilities in destination locations. A strong sub-set of this fad, was the large number of celebrity-themed restaurants.
Themed restaurants included celebrity-backed concepts such as Fashion Cafe (with models Campbell, MacPherson, and Schiffer), Planet Hollywood (Schwarzenneger, Stallone, and Willis), and the Official All-Star Sports Cafe (Agassi, Seles, and Gretzky), among many others.
Pure brand-based concepts included ESPN Cafe, Billboard Live!, Disney Stores, NASCAR Cafe, and dozens of others.
Still other themed concepts were based on intriguing concepts and/or environments such as Jekyll & Hyde Club, Drink!, Discovery Zone FunCenters, Dave & Busters, and Block Party.
Most of the venues created during the themed restaurant era enjoyed some consumer success but ultimately failed as consumers moved to the next concept.
History of Themed Restaurants and Clubs
First Unit - Openings
This chronology includes only some of the more notable entries in this product category from major players, and is not a representative list of all theme restaurant openings during the time period shown.
1971
Hard Rock Cafe (London, England)
1977
Chuck E. Cheese (San Jose, California)
1982
Dave & Buster's (Dallas, Texas)
1983
Medieval Times Dinner & Tournament (Kissimmee, Florida)
1984
Ed Debevic's (Phoenix, Arizona)
1988
Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede (Pigeon Forge, Tennessee)
1991
Planet Hollywood (New York City)
1992
America Live! (Bloomington, Minnesota)
Drink! (Chicago, Illinois)
House of Blues (Cambridge, Massachusetts)
1993
Entros (Seattle, Washington)
Michael Jordan's Restaurant (Chicago, Illinois)
P.F. Chang's China Bistro (Scottsdale, Arizona)
Front Row Sports Grill (Orlando, Florida)
1994
Rainforest Cafe (Bloomington, Minnesota)
Harley-Davidson Cafe (New York City)
Wildhorse Saloon (Nashville, Tennessee)
Dive! (Los Angeles, California)
Country Star American Music Grill (Universal City, California)
1995
Official All-Star Sports Cafe (New York City)
Fashion Cafe (New York City)
Jekyll & Hyde Club (New York City)
Motown Cafe (New York City)
1996
Billboard Live! (West Hollywood, California)
NASCAR Cafe (Myrtle Beach, South Carolina)
Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. (Monterey Bay, California)
Red's (Edmonton, Canada)
Fulton's Crab House (Orlando, Florida)
1997
Easyriders Cafe (Myrtle Beach, South Carolina)
1998
Motorsports Grill (Orlando, Florida)
ESPN Zone (Baltimore, Maryland)
Theme Restaurant Concepts that Did Not Make it to Market:
Cafe@Play
Classic Sports Network Restaurant
David Copperfield's Magic
National Lampoon Cafe
Sinatra's
Television City
TV Land
Vegas!
