Why Do People Love The Cheesecake Factory?

This is NOT a good thing...

So, my local Facebook "community talk" groups have been clogged the last few days with one post after another asking the same question: "When is the new Cheescake Factory going to open?" People are treating this event with the same crazed enthusiasm that went along with our bucolic little valley getting its first Golden Corral buffet restaurant (and the same total lack of the ability to search to see if the question has already been asked and answered dozens of times.)

For a chain restaurant to inspire this kind of foaming expectation, they must be doing something right. Viewed objectively, it's a little hard to pinpoint what makes them successful. First of all, the Factory takes pride in their enormous, encyclopedic menu that encompasses more than 250 items at any given time. They make a big deal about the fact that their dishes are cooked (mostly) from scratch, but let's face it - it's impossible to have Thai lettuce wraps, Cuban sandwiches, pasta carbonara, jambalaya, shrimp and chicken gumbo, pizzas, tuna poke, shrimp scampi, ribeye steaks, fish and chips, shepherd's pie, orange chicken, enchiladas, and of course cheesecake all come out of the same kitchen and have any of them be more than mediocre.

What the hell, let's throw some ads in too...

It's almost a cliche that when a restaurant has hundreds of different dishes from wildly unrelated cultures and cooking styles, it's a red flag. But it's all there on the Food Replicator Cheesecake Factory menu. Anything anyone could possibly think they want, pretty much, is waiting to be ordered, which of course raises a second red flag - how often do the ingredients that are shared by only a few of the hundreds of dishes actually get turned over?

Nevertheless, the Nourishment Strip Mine Cheesecake Factory is relentlessly popular. So popular, in fact, that people actually wait an hour or more for a table on busy nights. They'll sit there with their brood of children becoming increasingly unruly, waiting for their pager to go off, and looking at their phones, never once thinking, "hey, I have a device in my hand that I could use to find a different place to eat where I won't have to sit around waiting to eat food that's made on an assembly line!"

So why do they do it, and why does the Specialty Dessert Warehouse Cheesecake Factory inspire such loyalty and anticipation in people? As far as I can tell, it comes down to two main reasons:

It's Familiar And Safe

The same impulse that drives people to chain restaurants across the globe is definitely in play here. When you go to the Sadness Foundry Cheesecake Factory, there's no question about what you are going to get. The food will be unremarkable, but it won't surprise you, and since you already have no expectations, it won't disappoint you either. 

There's a reason why the writers for The Big Bang Theory selected this particular restaurant as the go-to choice for fictional fussbudget Sheldon Cooper in the early seasons of the show, even though they never received compensation (or even asked for permission) for the product placement. Sheldon likes routine. Sheldon hates change, or anything that takes him out of his narrow comfort zone, and using the Meal Assembly Line Cheesecake Factory as a punchline fit that paradigm perfectly.

'Cheesecake Factory - when you have a crippling mental illness that won't let you experience anything different!'

In later seasons, former waitresses Penny and Bernadette quit their jobs at the Food Pit Cheesecake Factory and take up careers in pharmaceutical sales, and Sheldon typically eats takeout with the rest of the gang, although his "quirky" picky eater nature still provides fodder for studio audience chortles from time to time. He's outgrown the Calorie Parking Garage Cheesecake Factory, just like he's slowly been fleshed out into a character with recognizable human traits instead of a fictionalized caricature of weaponized autism. His friends no longer have to acquiesce to his preferences all the time, which brings us to reason number two:

There's That One Man-Child In Every Group Who Only Wants Chicken Tenders And Fries

This right here is the "killer app" for the Dining Refugee Camp Cheesecake Factory. Once you pass a certain threshold of people in your party, you will inevitably have at least one who wields veto power over every option they don't like. Thai food? Too spicy. The Italian place on the corner with the homemade pasta? The sauce causes heartburn. Burgers and brews? The kitchen got a B card three years ago. Ramen? Pizza? Brazilian steakhouse? It's too hot outside, pizza is too greasy, and all that meat is too filling.

So there you are, held hostage by the one person who can't get with the program, ever. Because you're not a monster, you don't do the rational thing by calling them an Uber and telling them where they can meet you in two hours if they still want to hang out. Instead, you sigh, resign yourself to your fate, and say the one thing you promised yourself you would never say again:

"Ok, whatever. I guess we can go to the Cheesecake Factory..."

Epilogue:

I am sure that there will be some readers who disagree, and who will want to argue about how awesome and delicious the Random Food Flea Market Cheesecake Factory is, and insist that I haven't been there lately/just don't understand/am a huge food snob. I honestly envy you, and your ability to be so excited about and pleased with so-so food. Maybe I am spoiled by the dozens of great restaurants in my area I've already tried, or maybe I'm just in love with the idea of finding new ones that aren't part of a giant, mediocre chain churning out cookie cutter food. But you do you - the only person you have to please is yourself.