Steakhouses Buck Trends, Prove Their Staying Power in NYC
Some are appealing to more women with expanded menus and lighter décor
The foodie movement may view slabs of red meat with growing disdain. But business diners in New York City haven’t gotten the memo.
Eight of the top 15 highest-grossing restaurants among business diners in New York City are steakhouses, according to data from the app and website Table8, which connects diners with last-minute reservations. By contrast, San Francisco has one steakhouse in its top 15, and Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles have five each. The data are from 2014, the most recent available.
Numbers provide part of the explanation: New York has the fourth-most steakhouses of any state in the U.S., according to CHD Expert, a global food-service data provider.
Steakhouses have never quite gone out of style in the city. The dark paneling and leather furniture signals luxury and implies initiation into a kind of post-college fraternity. It is a safe choice that still impresses.
“It’s easiest to appease everybody,” said Damien Nguyen, a 26-year-old hedge-fund analyst. “You know what you’re going to order. The food comes out pretty much right away. You’re not worried about ‘does this guy like yellow tail or tuna in sushi rolls?’ ”
At the same time, Mr. Nguyen said his own enthusiasm was waning—and he isn’t alone.
“The old formula was: Get a great piece of steak and a great bottle of wine and nobody else would care how the place looks,” said Ken Lefkowitz, deputy chair of the Manhattan law firm Hughes Hubbard & Reed. “The world has changed.”
Mr. Lefkowitz estimated he once took 75% to 80% of his clients to steakhouses; now, it is more like 30%. The city’s steakhouse world shuddered in August when The Palm announced it was closing its original Manhattan location, which opened in 1926.
As New Yorkers’ palates evolve, and some steakhouses reach beyond the male clientele on which so many of them long have relied, newcomers are taking on traditionalists.
A formula nevertheless holds sway: The menus are straightforward (which allows some operations to lock in prices on their predictable ingredients) and the experience luxurious (though each restaurant defines it differently). Diners don’t blink an eye at spending $62 for 14-ounce filet mignon and a side of creamed spinach at Smith & Wollensky, or $67 for a 16-ounce prime strip with a starter of onion rings at Del Frisco’s Grille.
Del Frisco’s, part of a national chain, helped usher in a new steakhouse model when it opened the New York location in 2000, many said. Light flooded floor-to-ceiling windows in the nearly 35-foot-high dining room, defying the customary intimate, wood-paneled room.
A low thrum of Motown music sets the tone, said general managerScott Gould, citing qualities that could apply to steakhouses more broadly: “It has the right beat, it’s recognizable by everybody, it doesn’t offend anybody, it’s not slow, it’s got a nice style to it.”
Despite the occasional bachelorette party, Del Frisco’s clientele skews about 60% male, Mr. Gould said.
In recent years, a new generation of steakhouses, including STK, Quality Meats and Hunt & Fish Club, have further redefined the form, addressing the gender divide with broadened menus and lightened décor along with a younger, more diverse staff.
STK’s Midtown location has a bright interior design and a destination atmosphere, with DJs curating music throughout the evening. The clientele there is at least half women, said Jonathan Segal, founder and chief executive of ONE group, the holding company of STK.
Whether to seek women as diners is one of the major choices facing steakhouses, and some are fine with a clientele that is mostly men.
“The decision to go to a steakhouse is definitively male,” said Alan Stillman, who founded Smith & Wollensky in 1977. “The main function of a steakhouse is to supply a large piece of beef on a plate. And I think that attraction is a masculine attraction. I know a tremendous amount of women that love to go to our restaurants and we do tremendous business with women, but they’re the outliers.”
By contrast, at Quality Meats, developed by his son, around 45% of the customers are women, Mr. Stillman said. It offers an array of salads, an industrial-cool ambience and visible female staff members.
But for business diners, these new spaces can offer drawbacks. The smaller rooms can lead to longer wait times and awkward small talk. At a business dinner, “You don’t want to be stuck between two couples having a date,” Mr. Nguyen said. “It takes much more effort to go there, much more patience.”
The old school is alive and well. The original Manhattan location of Bobby Van’s is snug in the base of Helmsley building, with low ceilings, wood paneling and, at least on one recent afternoon, few female diners.
Co-owner Rick Passarelli said the secret with steakhouses was the “old cliché: You make money on everything except for steak.” Bobby Van’s offers 171 different wines (up to $825 a bottle), classic sides including hash browns ($13.95) and straightforward desserts, like cheesecake ($13).
One of the most popular orders, he said, remains the 40-ounce cowboy rib eye steak. It costs $59.95. “We do it the old fashioned way,” said Mr. Passarelli. “We’ve been in business 46 years. We don’t want to change.”
