How rising gas prices will affect restaurant sales

How rising gas prices will affect restaurant sales

From A Deeper Dive by Restaurant Business Magazine

March 25, 2026 · 29 min

About this episode

The episode discusses the impact of rising gas prices on restaurant sales and industry growth projections.

How will gas prices affect restaurants? This week’s episode of the Restaurant Business podcast A Deeper Dive features Rich Shank, senior principal with the data firm Technomic. We like talking with Shank periodically to get a pulse on where the industry is at and there are all kinds of questions about it right now, thanks to gas prices. Gas prices are near a national average of $4 a gallon, according to AAA, up $1 compared with the past year, driven largely by the U.S. attack on Iran. That has a real impact on consumers at a time when many of them are already feeling pinched by inflation. We ask Shank what kind of impact this will have, what restaurant chains will feel it the most and at what point does it diminish industry growth projections. We also talk a bit about other issues like beef costs and store operations and what happened with the fast-casual sector. Always great talking with Rich Shank so please check it out.

People in this episode

Guest: Rich Shank

Topics covered

  • gas prices
  • restaurant sales
  • inflation
  • industry growth
  • beef costs
  • fast-casual sector

Keywords

  • gas prices
  • restaurant industry
  • inflation
  • Technomic
  • Rich Shank
  • fast-casual
  • beef costs

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Technomic, AAA

Places: U.S., Iran

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