Olive Garden

• 1. Introduction

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  Olive Garden, the American casual dining chain built on Italian-American cooking, once became the star of a 294-slide presentation. The slideshow came from an activist hedge fund in September 2014, and much of it was aimed at a single restaurant brand. One slide mocked a vegetable lasagna topped with chicken. Its logic was simple: "if you wanted meat on your lasagna, you would order the meat lasagna." Investors do not usually argue over breadsticks and pasta water, yet that is where this fight happened. How does a restaurant that began as one unit inside a corporate parent grow large enough for its menu to become a shareholder battle? And how much of the Tuscan image it sells holds up when someone goes looking for it?

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• 2. Corporate Roots

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  The first Olive Garden opened on the 13th of December 1982 in Orlando, Florida. Four co-founders started it: Blaine Sweatt, Mark Given, Gino DeSantis and Dave Manuchia. It began as one unit of General Mills, which ran a restaurant division. By 1989 the chain had 145 restaurants, making it the fastest-growing unit in that division. Its per-store sales soon matched those of a former sister company, Red Lobster. In time it became the largest chain of Italian-themed full-service restaurants in the United States.

  In 1995 General Mills spun its restaurants off as a stand-alone company called Darden Restaurants. The name honored Bill Darden, the founder of Red Lobster. In 1998 the chain dropped "The" from its name as part of a rebranding.

  Growth was not smooth. Brad Blum, a former president of Olive Garden, recalled that sales in existing restaurants fell sharply, by 12% at one point, even while new locations kept opening. Sandra Pedicini of the Orlando Sentinel later wrote that "Darden reinvented the Olive Garden in the 1990s, from a floundering chain into an industry star."

  By 2009 the chain had become the cheapest in the Darden family. Its average check was $15.00 per person, against more than $90 at its sibling Capital Grille.

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• 3. Slump and Reinvention

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  In 2010 Olive Garden generated $3.3 billion in sales. Its closest competitor, Carrabba's Italian Grill, took in $650.5 million in the same year. That lead did not stop Darden from planning a much bigger footprint.

  At an analyst conference in February 2011, the parent company said it intended to add more than 200 Olive Garden locations over the following few years. It had already announced interest in new international markets, including the Middle East and Asia, because the North American market had matured. It also said it would begin licensing franchising partnerships. That was new for a chain that had grown only through company-owned locations.

  Later in 2011, Darden began placing Olive Garden and Red Lobster restaurants side by side. These sites were designed for smaller markets. Each had its own entrance and dining area, but the kitchen and support areas were shared. Customers could order only from the menu of the restaurant where they sat.

  Then sales slipped. At established Olive Garden locations, sales fell by 2.5% in the final quarter of 2011, and by 2012 they had decreased overall. A Darden president and chief operating officer described the chain as "a beloved, but somewhat expected brand." The company responded with a three-course meal for $12.95.

  Workers felt the pressure too. In 2011 the chain adopted a mandatory tip-out program that let it cut more of its employees' hourly wages to $2.13 per hour. In October 2012 it became one of the first national restaurant chains to test moving most of its staff to part-time work. The aim was to limit the cost of health care benefits for full-time employees.

  On the 9th of July 2014, Olive Garden launched a new logo and restaurant design. The refresh also brought online ordering and smaller lunch portions. That same year Darden announced plans to sell Red Lobster. It would close two shared locations in Georgia and South Carolina, and convert the remaining four into standalone Olive Garden restaurants.

  In 2018 Olive Garden became the largest casual-dining chain in the United States by system-wide sales. It kept that title until Texas Roadhouse passed it in 2025.

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• 4. Unlimited Promises

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  "Good Times, Great Salad, Olive Garden" was the chain's first slogan, back when advertising focused on unlimited salad. Once unlimited soup and breadsticks joined the menu, the slogan became "When you're here, you're family." In early 2013 it changed again, to "We're all family here."

  In the fall of 2013, the restaurant began its "Never Ending Pasta Bowl" promotion, with all-you-can-eat pasta starting at $9.99. During that event it served more than 13 million bowls. In 2014 the promotion returned with a new twist, the "Never Ending Pasta Pass." For $99, a buyer could eat all the pasta they wanted over a seven-week period. Only the first 1,000 people to buy the pass online could get one. The pass has been offered every year since.

  In 2019 came a bigger prize, the "Lifetime Pasta Pass." It went to the first fifty diners who signed up for the never-ending version.

  The food behind the promotions covers pasta dishes, steaks and salads. The company advertises its breadsticks and builds its lunch menu around them. It also says its soups and sauces are made fresh every day in each restaurant, rather than brought in from a commissary or an outside vendor.

  In June 2010 the menu borrowed an idea from sibling chain Seasons 52. Olive Garden began selling smaller desserts under the name "dolcini," modeled on that chain's "mini-indulgences."

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• 5. Tuscan Claims

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  Every year, Olive Garden sends a number of managers, trainers and cooks to Tuscany. The trip is real, but news outlets have described it as modest. The visitors stay in a rented hotel. They spend only a few hours at a time at a local restaurant, during its off-season.

  That matters because of what the chain's advertising says. It has advertised a cooking institute in Tuscany. News outlets reported that no such institute or school exists.

  The Tuscan imagery does have a physical anchor. Newer restaurants are styled after a farmhouse in the town of Castellina in Chianti, on the grounds of the Rocca delle Macie winery. That farmhouse holds the Riserva di Fizzano restaurant. Next to it stands what the company calls its Culinary Institute of Tuscany, which it dates to 1999.

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• 6. Global Footprint

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  As of the 13th of February 2022, Olive Garden operated 922 restaurants worldwide. In 2022 the brand accounted for $4.5 billion of Darden's $9.63 billion in revenue.

  Brazil got its first Olive Garden in 2014, in terminal 3 of Guarulhos International Airport in São Paulo. The airport now has two. Others serve other parts of São Paulo, including Center Norte and Morumbi, and one operates at Parque Dom Pedro in Campinas.

  Canada has a more mixed record. Restaurants operate in Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, Saskatoon, Regina and Langley, near Vancouver. In the 1990s Ontario had between 10 and 15 locations at various times. All of them closed or became Red Lobster restaurants in the early 2000s.

  Mexico City received two restaurants in late 2012, at Interlomas and Paseo de la Reforma. Both have since closed. Today there are four in Greater Mexico City, along with restaurants in Cancún, Guadalajara, León, Querétaro and three in the Monterrey area.

  The Philippines opened its first in 2020 at Ayala Malls Manila Bay. On the 22nd of March 2022, a restaurant opened in Guayaquil, Ecuador, at Riocentro Los Ceibos. Ecuador now has two in Guayaquil and one in Quito. Single restaurants also operate in San Salvador at La Gran Vía and in Jeddah at Atelier LaVie. Tocumen International Airport hosts two more.

  The newest entry on this map is also the oddest. On the 21st of June 2022, the first Olive Garden in Aruba opened at the Gloria complex. It is the chain's only location in the Netherlands, and technically its only one in a European sovereign state.

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• 7. Board Overthrown

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  Jeff Smith, founder of the hedge fund Starboard Value, built that presentation to unseat a board. His firm held a significant portion of Darden's stock and was challenging its management. The deck argued that the company was wasting money and failing its customers. Olive Garden's shortcomings were its centerpiece, and they drew considerable media attention.

  The details were specific. Smith said the unlimited breadsticks often went to waste because they went stale. He pointed to extra spending on custom-length straws. He said the menu, at 96 items, was too complex, and that some dishes made no sense.

  Pasta water drew his sharpest scorn. According to the deck, the chain had stopped salting the water used to cook pasta, in order to secure longer warranties on its pots. Smith was incredulous: "Pasta is Olive Garden's core dish and must be cooked properly." He added photos of poorly made dishes bought at restaurants, set beside the website's promotional pictures. He also included quotes from disappointed online reviewers.

  Darden's management replied two days later with a much shorter presentation. Without going into specifics, it conceded that most of the critiques were valid and said it was already addressing them. It defended the unlimited breadsticks as "conveying Italian hospitality." It also disputed one claim. The hedge fund had said the take-out packaging was dishwasher-safe and therefore needlessly expensive. Management said it was merely microwave-safe.

  The rebuttal did not save the board. A month later, shareholders voted to replace the company's entire board of directors with Starboard's slate.

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• 8. Rumors and Pledges

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  In August 2019, Darden had to answer a false claim that Olive Garden was financing Donald Trump's 2020 presidential campaign. The company said: "We don't know where this information came from, but it is incorrect. Our company does not donate to presidential candidates." Financial records show the chain had not contributed to the campaign.

  After the January 6 United States Capitol attack, Anderson Cooper joked that the rioters would be going to celebrate at Olive Garden once they left the Capitol. Darden also dismissed a rumor that the chain would revoke a lifetime pasta pass held by Sean Hannity. It called that story a "spoof."

  A quieter pressure came from animal welfare. In 2016, Darden announced it would phase out battery cage eggs in its U.S. locations by 2018. It also pledged to stop sourcing crated pork by 2025. That same year, Olive Garden faced protests from environmental, labor and animal welfare groups. They objected to its continued use of meat and dairy from animals raised in intensive conditions, including routine antibiotic use.

  In 2019 Darden said that by 2023 it would stop sourcing meat from chickens treated with medically important antibiotics. In 2022 the Open Wing Alliance criticized Darden and Olive Garden for insufficient progress on the cage-free egg pledge. Later that year, Darden widened the commitment to cover both U.S. and international locations, with a deadline of 2027.

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