What is the plan to invigorate the red lobster? The new CEO shares the vision

| March 13, 2025 | Seafood | No Comments

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  • The red lobster came out of bankruptcy in September with a new property and a new CEO focused on the revitalization of the brand.
  • Damola Adamolekun, the old CEO of PF Chang’s, aims to improve the quality of food and highlight the value while maintaining affordable prices.
  • The channel will receive new funding to support its revitalization plan and improve the customer experience.

The Red Lobster restaurant chain left bankruptcy last September, and its new leader turns to the future of the brand – with a certain inspiration from his childhood in Illinois.

Red Lobster filed a bankruptcy of chapter 11 last May due to a massive debt, dozens of places and a global drop in customers. The chain has closed more than 90 locations, including Illinois stores.

Fortress Investment Group LLC acquired the red lobster when leaving the bankruptcy and appointed Damola Adamolekun, Managing Director. The new CEO recently shared its lifetime affinity for the seafood restaurant with an infantile connection in the center of Illinois.

“I have been a fan of the red lobster since my first culinary experience at 9 years old in our restaurant in Springfield, Illinois,” said Adamolekun in the Breakfast Club, the longtime radio program in New York.

“And as I prepared myself to enter the role of the CEO,” he said, “I have met hundreds of guests across the country which, like me, are also passionate about the red lobster now that they were during their first visit.”

Who is the new CEO of the red lobster?

In 2020, Adamolekun, of Nigerian origin, became the first black CEO of the chain of Asian restaurants PF Chang’s, staying in this role until December 2023. It is recognized to sail in the chain through locking of COVVI-19 and refer it to growth thanks to a brand brand and the opening of new restaurants. During its mandate, the chain launched PF Chang’s to go.

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Before becoming CEO of PF Chang, he was his strategy director and partner of the main owner of the channel, the investment company based in New York, Paulsen & Co. He also sat on the board of directors of PF Chang’s, Inday, the National Association Restaurant and the International Mines of Tower Hill.

How the new CEO plans to save the red lobster

In breakfast, Adamolekun has implemented a simple strategy to revitalize the company: improve the quality of the product of the red lobster while continuing to offer affordable prices.

“If you want lobster and you want it for $ 20, we have the lobster roll for this price on certain markets,” he said. “At the same time, the value is what you get for the price. If hospitality is much better, food is more interesting, drinks are fun and you pay the same price for all of this; People will perceive it as value. »»

More than $ 60 million in new financial support has enabled the company to develop a long -term plan, said Adamolekun. He hopes he would invigorate the red lobster while keeping his foot as a place of celebration nostalgic for many.

“The red lobster has a huge future,” he said, “and I can’t wait to start our plan with more than 30,000 members of the company team in the United States and Canada.”

Adamolekun, 36, also wants to increase public awareness of the quality of the red lobster. He estimated that the red lobster buys a quarter of all lobsters caught on boats and a quarter of the crab captured in North America. The whole lobster and the chain crabs are captured in nature, he said, because they cannot be raised on the farm.

“The lobster you get Red Lobster is as good as the lobster you get anywhere, but people don’t know,” he said. “There is one aspect of communications. We need to let people know that this is the best product you can get. »»

Adamolekun also said that the locations of the red lobster could benefit from upgrades inside, and that the company works on a plan for this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjfqvobkxcu

Red lobster story

Entrepreneur Bill Darden opened the first red lobster franchise in Lakeland, Florida, 1968. The company estimated that it operates more than 500 restaurants in the United States and Canada and is the largest world of seafood purchasing.

The former head of the management of the red lobster, Jonathan Tibus, said that the “ultimate endless shrimp” promotion of the chain had led to a loss of $ 11 million for the company. The COVVI-19 pandemic also played a key role in the financial fall of the chain. Since 2019, the number of guests has decreased by 30% and has recovered “only marginally” as the pandemic has calmed down.

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