Nope – small dead animals

The Food Professor- Canada Is Poised to Lose 4,000 Restaurants in 2026. Does Anyone Care?

15 Replies to “Nope”

Funny though, every 2 months or so my wife gets together with a few of her old workmates at a local restaurant. So far she has always come home with the same report: “I thought times were supposed to be getting tougher … the place was packed!”

“Canada is poised to lose 4,000 restaurants in 2026.”

Admittedly, Canada is pretty big country so perhaps you have a good chance of finding them.

According to the graph in the article approximately 6000 restaurants closed in 2025.

Restaurants started disappearing over a decade ago. In my area, we lost Milestones, Swiss Chalet, A&W and nearly all of the Italian and European places. Most are now Korean, Indian, and mixed asian. Rice, anyone?

Every time the provincial government jacks up the minimum wage, the restaurant on the edge of closing gets pushed over that edge as it is no longer profitable. Employers can be compelled to pay a particular wage but their customers cannot be compelled to buy their product. The real minimum wage is zero.

The problem must be that food prices have gone up faster than wages plus minimum wages keep going up. Once a month or so we buy a couple plates of food, cokes, and tip for about $55 at a Vietnamese place. 5 years ago it was half that. We’ve known the lady that runs it for close to 40 years and she’s cheaper than the other couple similar places.

” … mounting financial fatigue …”

Canada and CA are dismally similar

Trudeau and his bankster buddy are responsible, since they inflated the currency to “deal” with covid, resulting in inflation of over 20% but wage growth didn’t match (nor did tax bracket adjustments), which means the average consumer can’t afford to eat out as often. Combine expensive food, with meh service, and marginal restaurants will close (but those used for money laundering and serving politicians will stick around).

For years restaurants basically made 5% of sales. Most aren’t getting close to that now. There will always be some places that do well even in a recession. They have the customers that aren’t effected by any of this. Rich folks, school teachers and other government workers. You don’t see the average joe or pensioner out for a sandwich and a beer anymore. This hits the family businesses harder than the chain restaurants.

Got a few gift cards to use up……………………….

When the government makes everything expensive, the people adjust their lifestyles.
Wait till the Arseholes make everybody not in the Party poor, then we’ll really see some restaurant deaths.

Pro tip – In Ontario anyways…when you find yourself on the ropes, fighting for your life and want to win hearts and minds it’s never a good idea from an optics perspective to have the Ontario Restaurant Hotel and Motel Association advocate for a more flexible Temporary Foreign Workers Program and make their pathway to citizenship “easier”. HUH??!!??
That’s Carney’s job…not yours.
Does anyone care? – Gonna be upfront with you. Not really. Still smarting from the Covid era. Wife says to let it slide…I just can’t.

This is the same thing that’s happening in Britain, all the pubs and little restaurants are going out of business. Places that survived WWI and WWII, including the bombing, are now going under. Taxes, apparently.

When you see the same thing repeated over and over, it’s a policy. Not an accident or an economic “shortfall.”

“In the future, all restaurants are Taco Bell.”