The Cheesecake Factory has reopened about 25 percent of its dining rooms across the country with limited capacity, according to a business update released late Tuesday by the Calabasas restaurant operator. The first locations to resume dine-in operations did so in the second week of May. Since reopening, the restaurants have posted sales numbers averaging roughly 75 percent of prior year sales, the company said. As many states have only approved dine-in restaurants to reopen at a fraction of their total capacity, the company attributes the performance to “continued strength in off-premise sales.” It has been a rough year for Cheesecake Factory – shares are down almost 40 percent from Jan. 1 – but the solid sales at reopened locations shows promise for the company’s recovery, and its stock surged on Wednesday. The Cheesecake Factory operates a total of 294 restaurants in the United States and Canada, including North Italia, Flower Child, and several other banners within the Fox Restaurant Group portfolio, which it acquired last year. Of the 200 namesake Cheesecake Factory locations, 34 are now open for dine-in customers. That includes two Conejo Valley outlets at The Oaks Mall in Thousand Oaks and the Collection at Riverpark in Oxnard. Additional Valley outlets at the Americana at Brand shopping center in Glendale, the Sherman Oaks Galleria, the Westfield Topanga mall in Canoga Park and the Valencia Town Center remain closed to dine-in customers. Looking ahead, the company said it expects to have approximately 65 percent of dining rooms that closed due to COVID-19 reopened with limited capacity by mid-June. That includes an expected 124 Cheesecake Factory restaurants. The company admitted this plan could change depending on the development of the coronavirus pandemic and civil unrest related to the alleged killing of George Floyd by a white police officer in Minnesota last month. Cheesecake Factory’s stock price jumped following the update. Shares (CAKE) rose 8 percent in after-hours trading on Tuesday, and closed up $3.42, or more than 16 percent, to $24.37 on the Nasdaq on Wednesday, a day when the Nasdaq overall went up 0.78 percent.
