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Ruby Tuesday history
Ruby Tuesday company history timeline
Ruby Tuesday was founded in 1972 by a University of Tennessee student named Sandy Beall, who took the name from a song by the Rolling Stones, still a band that frightened parents at the time.
With that money, and another $10,000 put together with four of his University of Tennessee fraternity brothers, the first Ruby Tuesday restaurant was opened in 1972.
Ruby Tuesday at the corner of Summit & 19th in Columbus, OH opened without much fanfare in August 1973.
Morrison's fortunes were turned around following the appointment of Ernest Eugene Bishop as CEO in 1980.
In April 1982, Sandy sold the expanded 16-unit Ruby Tuesday chain to Morrison Inc. for $15 million in cash and stock.
By 1982, ten years after its founding, Ruby Tuesday was a 15 restaurant chain.
The first Silver Spoon opened in 1984, also in Knoxville.
At fiscal year-end 1985, there were 35 Ruby Tuesdays in business, more than double the number at the time of the sale, along with seven L&N restaurants.
By 1985, the chain had grown to operate 35 locations, and was a major contributor to the renewed success of Morrison's.
In 1986 Bishop asked Beall to relocate to Mobile to become president and COO of Morrison, and Beall agreed, proving his dedication and his desire to succeed Bishop by leaving his beloved Hilton Head.
Morrison Inc. was renamed Morrison Restaurants Inc. in 1992 to reflect the importance of their restaurant investments.
In 1993 Silver Spoon units began to be converted to Mozzarella's, which featured a variety of pasta dishes and pizzas, as well as fresh seafood, steak, and grilled chicken selections.
Beall continued to revamp the Ruby Tuesday Group later in 1993 and in the following two years.
The year 1993 also saw the debut of Sweetpea's, a Southern-style dinner house, in suburban Atlanta.
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In 1994, having already grown to four units, the Sweetpea's name was changed to Snapp's because the Ruby Tuesday Group could not secure legal rights to the name and because the Dallas-based Black-eyed Pea (another Southern-style restaurant) raised objections to the name, fearing customer confusion.
In mid-1994, the Ruby Tuesday Group announced that it would phase out the L&N Seafood Grill concept, given that L&N could not conform to the Ruby Tuesday under $10 check average.
As part of the joint venture agreement, the Ruby Tuesday Group was given a five-year option to acquire Tia's, which it did in January 1995 for $9 million in common stock.
In May 1995 Ruby Tuesday entered into a license agreement with Jardine Pacific to develop Ruby Tuesday restaurants in the Asia-Pacific region.
The first Ruby Tuesday located outside the United States opened in Hong Kong in July 1995, with additional units planned for mainland China, Singapore, Malaysia, and Australia.
On March 9, 1996, the shareholders of Morrison's approved a distribution and dissolved Morrison Restaurants Inc. into three separate companies: Ruby Tuesday Inc., Morrison Health Care Inc., and Morrison's Fresh Cooking Inc.
Although revenues increased 20.3 percent to $620.1 million in fiscal 1996, the company posted a net loss of $2.9 million due in part to increased competition in its restaurant sector and in part to $25.9 million in asset impairment and restructuring charges that were posted during the third quarter.
The popularity of old-school cafeterias where primarily elderly diners would pick out meal components before hitting the register was starting to fade, and in 1996 the company decided to spin off Ruby Tuesday as a stand-alone operator.
Beall ran them all as CEO of the restaurant group, which was spun off as a separate public company in 1996.
During 1997 the company established an international division to facilitate overseas growth, and it also began franchising.
1997: Franchising of the Ruby Tuesday concept begins.
Ruby Tuesday's first year of its second period as an independent company was a rough one. For example, during the fiscal year ending in June 1998, 48 restaurants in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, and a few other markets were sold to franchisees.
1998: Company headquarters are reestablished in Maryville, Tennessee.
For fiscal year 1999, revenues grew just 1.5 percent, reaching $722.3 million, but profits jumped 25.6 percent, to $36.5 million.
In anticipation of the sale, the company took a $10.1 million charge, cutting into profits for the fiscal year ending in June 2000.
Although Ruby Tuesday saw some softening of sales, particularly at its mall locations, in the immediate aftermath of September 11, 2001, when consumers pulled back on their spending, the overall trend was positive.
Ruby Tuesday joined this successful trend by launching what was eventually called "curb-side to-go" at selected locations in 2001.
Then in April 2004, in an unprecedented move, the restaurants began using menus that included nutritional information for every item, listing calories, total fat, net carbs, and fiber.
The elimination of the coupons and the negative customer response to the portion cuts were factors in a 5 percent decline in sales during the second half of the 2004 calendar year.
In August 2007, Ruby Tuesday Inc. ventured back into other concepts with their newly acquired Asian dining restaurant, Wok Hay.
In October 2008, a second location was opened in a former Ruby Tuesday restaurant building.
Ruby Tuesday is one the market's biggest winners in this bull cycleAs bad as things have been -- and continue to be -- for the fading casual dining operator, shares of Ruby Tuesday traded as low as $0.85 when the market bottomed out in March of 2009.
In September 2010, Ruby Tuesday Inc. continued its venture into other concepts with an agreement to license the Lime Fresh Mexican Grill brand.
As of 2011, the company was researching conversion of poorly performing Ruby Tuesday restaurants into some of these concepts.
On April 4, 2012, Ruby Tuesday Inc. announced that it had purchased fast-casual chain Lime Fresh Mexican Grill for $24 million cash.
Beall retired as CEO in 2012, surrendering his stewardship of the brand for the first time in 40 years.
In 2013, after posting a second quarter loss of $15.1 million, or 24 cents a share, Ruby Tuesday decided to close 13 Marlin & Ray's restaurants and its one Wok Hay location, exiting from both concepts.
Lime Fresh was the last alternative option closed, with 11 units shut and the remaining eight locations sold to Rubio’s in 2015 for $6.3 million.
It got it in September 2016, and longtime casual-dining veteran and former Boston Market chief Lane Cardwell was brought in as interim CEO until a permanent replacement for Buettgen could be found.
Hyatt’s appointment was announced in April 2017.
The $146 million deal was finalized December 21, 2017.
Hyatt was out and Hashim was in as CEO by December 2018.
On October 7, 2020, Ruby Tuesday filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection.
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Ruby Tuesday competitors
| Company name | Founded date | Revenue | Employee size | Job openings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Panera Bread | 1981 | $2.8B | 140,000 | 3,689 |
| Applebee's Canada | 1980 | $2.5B | 28,000 | 1,446 |
| Buffalo Wild Wings | 1982 | $2.0B | 44,000 | 1,631 |
| Wendy's | 1969 | $2.2B | 12,500 | 3,713 |
| Pizza Hut | 1958 | $7.5B | 350,000 | 10,811 |
| Red Lobster | 1968 | $2.6B | 55,000 | 2,201 |
| Sonic Drive-In | 1953 | $423.6M | 5,000 | 6,477 |
| Chipotle Mexican Grill | 1993 | $11.3B | 64,570 | 4,159 |
| Chili's Grill & Bar | 1975 | $4.4B | 13,000 | 127 |
| IHOP | 1958 | $349.6M | 32,300 | 1,986 |
Ruby Tuesday history FAQs
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Ruby Tuesday may also be known as or be related to RUBY TUESDAY INC, Ruby Tuesday, Ruby Tuesday Inc, Ruby Tuesday Inc., Ruby Tuesday Operations LLC and Ruby Tuesday, Inc.