How Dating Culture Helped Inspire A Once-Popular Restaurant Chain

If you are in the market for loaded potato skins, what's the first place that comes to mind? Even these days, it's probably TGI Fridays. The chain is often credited with inventing the loaded potato skin, and it's famous for its extensive menu of appetizers and variety of cocktails. According to TGI Fridays, the brand is about celebrating the "freeing and liberating spirit of 'Friday.'" Less widely known is that the restaurant chain was started in 1965 by perfume salesman Alan Stillman, whose goal was not to sell food or drinks, but to meet women.

"It wasn't easy to meet women," Stillman told Punch in 2015. The restaurateur lived on the Upper East Side of New York at the time and was particularly fascinated by the number of flight attendants in the neighborhood, none of whom seemed to gather anywhere socially in large numbers. Especially not in bars. So, he came up with a scheme to change that. Instead of hunting down cocktail party after cocktail party in the hopes of meeting women, he planned to create a permanent, public cocktail party that felt like Friday night.

At the time, meeting other singles at a bar was a novel idea. Time Magazine even wrote about the growing trend of "dating bars" in 1967, only a few years after Fridays opened its doors. These businesses catered to singles specifically. In fact, the term "singles bar" emerged from this and was still going strong through the 1970s. But while the trend began dying out in the '80s and early '90s, Fridays remained.

"Thank God it's Friday" was a saying used by the younger crowd in '65, which is why Stillman chose it. He decorated his restaurant in a "feminizing" way that included ferns and Tiffany lamps. From the very first night, his bar was a success. Stillman boasted that Fridays had the first line in restaurant, bar, and disco history. Soon, others in the neighborhood followed suit. As more singles bars opened, they attracted larger crowds. Barhopping became common, and TGI Fridays was at the center of it all.

Singles had not really been socially active in bars prior to Stillman's efforts. It was almost unheard of for single women to go to bars at the time. Stillman exposed that neither was the environment nor the menu of most bars appealing to women or younger people. So, he designed a menu with familiar American foods like burgers, fries, and Long Island Iced Teas designed for a young, social crowd. Eventually, habits and tastes evolved, and the idea of a singles bar became sleazy to many. Social gathering places shifted from the bar scene to places like coffee shops and diners. Later, in the digital age, it evolved again so that people increasingly met online instead.

Eventually, Stillman sold TGI Fridays in the 1970s. The new owners adapted to the times, changing as the singles who once frequented it changed, offering a line of frozen appetizers and fun cocktails. The business has been struggling recently and now there are fewer than 100 locations left. It may need to change with the times again if it hopes to stay afloat in the future.