Prototype Issue
Fish Back In Water
By Charlie Amter
(page 1 of 1)Red Lobster returns to Central LA, and boy, the neighborhood couldn't be happier.
Of all the newly opened LA restaurants this year, one dining hot spot stands out. After a three-year hiatus from Central LA, suburban dining fixture Red Lobster has opened an Inglewood franchise to compete for your urban-dining dollar. And all the “juice” in Hollywood won’t help you get a table there: At 8 p.m. on a recent Wednesday, the wait for a table was 30 minutes—no matter who your publicist was.
“It has been just crazy since the day we opened the doors,” said bartender Khai Blake, adding, with a smile, “You should have seen how busy we were on Valentine’s Day.”
Since the closing of Red Lobster’s Wilshire and Beverly Blvd. locations a few years ago, fans of the eatery’s annual Lobsterfest celebration have had to drive to Monrovia, Brea or Torrance to get their fix of RL-style fresh rock-lobster tail or steamed snow-crab legs. Now, seafood lovers of all stripes are descending on Inglewood to get a taste of the national chain’s beloved lobster, biscuits and assorted seafood specialties.
“People have been coming from all over to eat at the restaurant,” said Red Lobster’s director of Southern California operations, James Martin. “We’ve attracted customers from Beverly Hills all the way into the Manhattan Beach area.”
Martin is not kidding—the Inglewood location has served between 7,000 and 8,000 customers a week since its February 12 opening. The clientele is a motley mix of locals and hipsters who embrace the irony of eating suburban comfort food in the middle of one of LA’s most underestimated neighborhoods. Make no mistake—the food here is good, and a great value—sure to keep a wide cross-section of Angelenos coming in.
Red Lobster’s widespread appeal is just what Inglewood Mayor Roosevelt Dorn had in mind when he invited the seafood franchise to be one of the anchor restaurant tenants at the new Century Blvd. mall complex, the Village at Century, which houses several other notable restaurants and retailers familiar to the strip-mall savvy nationwide.
“It’s a fantastic addition to the city of Inglewood and they are doing very well,” said Dorn. “In fact, it’s very difficult to get in for lunch or dinner, even for me, and still I’ve been four times since they opened.”
Red Lobster’s Inglewood branch employs more than 200 locals. “From a customer and employee standpoint, the city of Inglewood has exceeded our expectations,” said director of operations Martin. “We have been able to attract and hire excellent employees.”
Bartender Blake is just one of those excellent employees. “I love this job,” Blake said. “Everyone just seems to be in a good mood here.”
With snow-crab legs and fresh lobster tail piled high on plates as far as the eye can see, it’s easy to believe.
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