Comfort food is king in 2020 and more and more people are turning to chicken wings to find that comfort. According to Grubhub, chicken wings are 287 percent more popular this year than last year. And they are the third most popular delivery order amid the pandemic.
With chicken wings ever more popular, the parent company of Hooters, HOA Brands, is doubling down on its wing business. The company's fast-casual restaurant, Hoots Wings, will be franchising with 17 new locations planned for 2021 and another 35 for 2022. Hoots is focused on takeout and delivery to cater to the stay-at-home economy.
Despite the struggles in the restaurant industry, CEO Sal Melilli said that now is the perfect time for Hoots Wings to … take flight.
"At the end of the day we face the same challenges with closures and sales and restaurants being limited," said Melilli. "But based on this model and based on demand for the product and the phenomenal wings, we came back very quickly."
The wing-focused restaurant was not only able to bring sales back to life but open new units during the pandemic. The company has partnered with all major delivery services to get wings to customers faster. And while the menu is limited to only a few food items — mainly wings — the order options are pretty endless, having more than 10,000 different wing combinations.
"When you look at all of our combinations of the wings, the bone-in the boneless, with all the different sauces, dips, and rubs it can be a little bit of a challenge but it makes it exciting when you're a customer trying to make a decision of which one you want," he said.
The secret to good wings? The HOA CEO said that it's about experience. The first Hoots Wings location opened four years ago in Chicago but chicken wings have been this company's specialty for much longer.
"We realized that with 37 years of being in the chicken wing business with Hooters, that our consumer really wanted the product," Melilli explained. "And we saw demand back in 2015 and '16 begin to really skyrocket for taking the product home and consuming it off-premise so this was just a natural fit."
The Rev. Al Sharpton is set to lead a protest march on Wall Street to urge corporate America to resist the Trump administration’s campaign to roll back diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. The New York civil rights leader will join clergy, labor and community leaders Thursday in a demonstration through Manhattan’s Financial District that’s timed with the anniversary of the Civil Rights-era March on Washington in 1963. Sharpton called DEI the “civil rights fight of our generation." He and other Black leaders have called for boycotting American retailers that scaled backed policies and programs aimed at bolstering diversity and reducing discrimination in their ranks.
President Donald Trump's administration last month awarded a $1.2 billion contract to build and operate what's expected to become the nation’s largest immigration detention complex to a tiny Virginia firm with no experience running correction facilities.
Chipmaker Nvidia is poised to release a quarterly report that could provide a better sense of whether the stock market has been riding an overhyped artificial intelligence bubble or is being propelled by a technological boom that’s still gathering momentum.
Cracker Barrel said late Tuesday it’s returning to its old logo after critics — including President Donald Trump — protested the company’s plan to modernize.
Low-value imports are losing their duty-free status in the U.S. this week as part of President Donald Trump's agenda for making the nation less dependent on foreign goods. A widely used customs exemption for international shipments worth $800 or less is set to end starting on Friday. Trump already ended the “de minimis” rule for inexpensive items sent from China and Hong Kong, but having to pay import taxes on small parcels from everywhere else likely will be a big change for some small businesses and online shoppers. Purchases that previously entered the U.S. without needing to clear customs will be subject to the origin country’s tariff rate, which can range from 10% to 50%.
Southwest Airlines will soon require plus-size travelers to pay for an extra seat in advance if they can't fit within the armrests of one seat. This change is part of several updates the airline is making. The new rule starts on Jan. 27, the same day Southwest begins assigning seats. Currently, plus-size passengers can pay for an extra seat in advance and later get a refund, or request a free extra seat at the airport. Under the new policy, refunds are still possible but not guaranteed. Southwest said in a statement it is updating policies to prepare for assigned seating next year.
Cracker Barrel is sticking with its new logo. For now. But the chain is also apologizing to fans who were angered when the change was announced last week.
Elon Musk on Monday targeted Apple and OpenAI in an antitrust lawsuit alleging that the iPhone maker and the ChatGPT maker are teaming up to thwart competition in artificial intelligence.
