Many local foodies have had a love-hate relationship with Texas Roadhouse, a US-based steakhouse chain, since the brand opened its first outlet in Taipei in late October on the third floor of Breeze Song Gao department store (微風松高) in Xinyi District (信義).
The popularity of the Taipei outlet — the chain’s first in Asia — has often seen customers waiting in line at weekends, with some patrons complaining on the restaurant’s Facebook page about reservation difficulties during its first month in operation.
Texas Roadhouse Inc global development group vice president Hugh Carroll attributed the restaurant chain’s good start here to similarities between Taiwanese and US consumers.
“I am very familiar with the Taiwanese market,” Carroll, who has lived in Taiwan, said during an interview in Taipei last month.
Carroll said Taiwan and the US have many traits in common, including families that enjoy eating out at a “fun” restaurant, which led to the easy acceptance of the American-style restaurant.
On top of good food, incorporating “fun” is important for building Texas Roadhouse’s brand, he said.
Edgar Lee, a 32-year-old Taiwanese who lived in the US for three years while working on his masters degree, said the cost-to-performance ratio, fun atmosphere and high quality of beef made Texas Roadhouse one of his favorite restaurants in the US.
“I usually went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner with friends every one or two months,” Lee said.
From its first outlet in Clarksville, Indiana, which opened in 1993, Texas Roadhouse has grown to more than 440 restaurants in the US.
The NASDAQ-listed company reported sales of US$1.18 billion in the first three quarters of this year, an increase of 13 percent from the same period last year.
“My [original] goal was to own not just a family restaurant and not just a steak restaurant, but a place where everyone, of all ages, could come and have a great meal and great fun, for a great price,” Texas Roadhouse founder, chairman and chief executive officer Kent Taylor, told the Taipei Times.
With an average customer spending between US$15 and US$20, the chain says that everything on the menu is made from scratch, with a butcher hand-cutting every steak and freshly baked bread available every five minutes.
In the hope of increasing interactions between restaurant employees and customers, and developing the “fun” theme, Texas Roadhouse has come up with a novel celebration for customers spending their birthday or wedding dinner at the restaurant: The customers are invited to sit on a saddle, while everyone else in the restaurant gives them a big “Yeehaw.”
The company has a goal to open 25 to 30 new stores in the US per year, which would expand the total number of its outlets to between 700 and 800 stores in the next 10 years, Taylor said.
In addition, Texas Roadhouse aims to develop itself into a world-class steakhouse chain through overseas expansion, he said.
The company has opened stores in Taiwan, Dubai and Kuwait through the franchise model.
It plans to enter the markets in Abu Dhabi and the Philippines by the end of this year, with Canada and Mexico to follow next year, Taylor said.
Roadhouse Restaurants Taiwan Ltd (路德斯) — the operator of Texas Roadhouse in Taiwan and a unit of Bayshore Pacific Hospitality Ltd (北軒餐飲管理) — is scheduled to open seven to 10 stores in Taiwan within the next five to seven years, with the Greater Taipei area to be its major market.
The second outlet in Taipei is set to open for business tomorrow at Minsheng Community (民生社區) in uptown Taipei.
As for China, which has a big consumer market and growing demand for beef, Bayshore Pacific president and chief operating officer Merritt Croker said the company is looking to continue cooperation with the US steakhouse chain to eventually introduce Texas Roadhouse there, given its experience and strength in developing the brand in Taiwan.
The US dollar was trading at NT$29.7 at 10am today on the Taipei Foreign Exchange, as the New Taiwan dollar gained NT$1.364 from the previous close last week. The NT dollar continued to rise today, after surging 3.07 percent on Friday. After opening at NT$30.91, the NT dollar gained more than NT$1 in just 15 minutes, briefly passing the NT$30 mark. Before the US Department of the Treasury's semi-annual currency report came out, expectations that the NT dollar would keep rising were already building. The NT dollar on Friday closed at NT$31.064, up by NT$0.953 — a 3.07 percent single-day gain. Today,
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
The New Taiwan dollar and Taiwanese stocks surged on signs that trade tensions between the world’s top two economies might start easing and as US tech earnings boosted the outlook of the nation’s semiconductor exports. The NT dollar strengthened as much as 3.8 percent versus the US dollar to 30.815, the biggest intraday gain since January 2011, closing at NT$31.064. The benchmark TAIEX jumped 2.73 percent to outperform the region’s equity gauges. Outlook for global trade improved after China said it is assessing possible trade talks with the US, providing a boost for the nation’s currency and shares. As the NT dollar
PRESSURE EXPECTED: The appreciation of the NT dollar reflected expectations that Washington would press Taiwan to boost its currency against the US dollar, dealers said Taiwan’s export-oriented semiconductor and auto part manufacturers are expecting their margins to be affected by large foreign exchange losses as the New Taiwan dollar continued to appreciate sharply against the US dollar yesterday. Among major semiconductor manufacturers, ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光), the world’s largest integrated circuit (IC) packaging and testing services provider, said that whenever the NT dollar rises NT$1 against the greenback, its gross margin is cut by about 1.5 percent. The NT dollar traded as strong as NT$29.59 per US dollar before trimming gains to close NT$0.919, or 2.96 percent, higher at NT$30.145 yesterday in Taipei trading
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