{"id":26812,"date":"2026-09-14T19:48:20","date_gmt":"2026-09-14T19:48:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/26812\/"},"modified":"2026-09-14T19:48:20","modified_gmt":"2026-09-14T19:48:20","slug":"38-year-old-beloved-steakhouse-chain-closing-over-40-locations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/26812\/","title":{"rendered":"38-year-old beloved steakhouse chain closing over 40 locations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Steakhouse dining chains have faced a challenging year of rising beef prices, which increased by 9.4% year-over-year in July 2026, making it harder for many restaurants to maintain profitable businesses and keep their doors open.<\/p>\n<p>Among the restaurant chains implementing plans to improve their business performance is Bloomin\u2019 Brands\u2019 Outback Steakhouse, which has closed locations that no longer make economic sense to operate.  <\/p>\n<p>Outback Steakhouse is closing two more of its restaurants about 10 months after the chain\u2019s owner Bloomin\u2019 Brands launched a multi-year turnaround strategy that will eliminate locations that lack the potential for growth.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"820\" height=\"547\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"standard-img w-full w-full h-auto\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/outback-steakhouse.jpg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Outback Steakhouse is closing restaurant locations that lack the potential for growth.Justin Sullivan \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Outback shuts Wyoming location<\/p>\n<p>The 38-year-old steakhouse chain abruptly closed its Evansville, Wyo., location on Aug. 23, 2026, and posted a farewell note on its front door.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cG\u2019Day Casper\/Evansville: Outback Steakhouse is now closed. Thank you for all your support over the last 21 years. It has been a pleasure working with so many great, local Outbackers over the years. To all the fond memories!!! Cheers, The Outback Team,\u201d the note stated.<\/p>\n<p>The Evansville location, which opened in November 1998, was operated by a franchisee, according to a media representative from Outback Steakhouse parent company Bloomin\u2019 Brands. The company did not have any information about the closing because the location was owned by a franchisee, Bloomin\u2019 Brands told Oil City News.<\/p>\n<p>The franchisee, whose name was not listed in the farewell note, had owned the Evansville location since about 2005 or 21 years, based on the message on the restaurant door.<\/p>\n<p>Outback continues to operate one other location in Wyoming at 1626 Fleischli Business Parkway in Cheyenne.<\/p>\n<p>Chain closing Baltimore steakhouse<\/p>\n<p>Outback Steakhouse will also close its restaurant at 2400 Boston Street in Baltimore on Oct. 11 after over 20 years of operating, an Outback spokesperson told WBAL-TV. The chain will continue to operate a location at 4215 Ebenezer Road in Baltimore and 21 other restaurants in Maryland.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are incredibly grateful to the community for its support over the years and to our team members, past and present, for their many contributions to this restaurant,\u201d Outback said in a statement to Baltimore Business Journal. \u201cWe\u2019ve been proud to be part of the community and appreciate the many guests who have chosen to dine with us over the years.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Australian-themed restaurant chain did not state a reason for closing the restaurant, but suggested that customers could visit the chain\u2019s restaurants in Glen Burnie and Perry Hall, Md.<\/p>\n<p>Bloomin\u2019 Brands closed nine restaurants in its portfolio, including four company-owned restaurants and five franchised, and opened five in its second quarter of 2026, which ended June 28.<\/p>\n<p>Operator closing dozens of restaurants<\/p>\n<p>As part of the restaurant operator\u2019s turnaround strategy, it closed 21 U.S. restaurants in 2025 and chose not to renew the leases on 22 additional U.S. locations. The company said the majority of those leases were set to expire over the following four years.<\/p>\n<p>The company was satisfied with the turnaround\u2019s second quarter performance, based on CEO Mike Spanos\u2019s comment.<\/p>\n<p>Related: National specialty clothing chain closing all its stores<\/p>\n<p>Pleased with turnaround progress<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI am pleased with our financial results in the second quarter and our continued progress on the Outback Turnaround, which has led us to raise our full-year earnings guidance,\u201d Spanos said in an Aug. 5 statement. \u201cWe remain focused on consistency of execution across food, service, experience, and affordability to deliver a great guest experience.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Outback Steakhouse, founded in 1988, has 660 locations in 44 states in the U.S., according to its locator page on its website. The chain\u2019s parent, Bloomin\u2019 Brands, is one of the world\u2019s largest casual restaurant companies with over 1,440 locations in 46 states, Guam, and 12 countries.<\/p>\n<p>Bloomin Brands\u2019 dining portfolio includes Outback Steakhouse, Carrabba\u2019s Italian Grill, Bonefish Grill, and Fleming\u2019s Prime Steakhouse &amp; Wine Bar, as of Aug. 5.<\/p>\n<p>Related: Sports league\u2019s players question future in Chapter 11 bankruptcy<\/p>\n<p>This story was originally published by TheStreet on Sep 13, 2026, where it first appeared in the Restaurants section. Add TheStreet as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Steakhouse dining chains have faced a challenging year of rising beef prices, which increased by 9.4% year-over-year in July 2026, making it harder for many restaurants to maintain profitable businesses and keep their doors open. Among the restaurant chains implementing plans to improve their business performance is Bloomin\u2019 Brands\u2019 Outback Steakhouse, which has closed locations<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26813,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[106,107,108,109,104,105],"class_list":["post-26812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-steakhouses","tag-steak-house","tag-steak-houses","tag-steak-restaurant","tag-steak-restaurants","tag-steakhouse","tag-steakhouses"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/vive.im\/@dnc\/117271123983969373","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}