There was a time when Outback Steakhouse was the place. Friday night, maybe Saturday. You’d put your name in, wait 45 minutes on a buzzer, and not even mind because you knew a Bloomin’ Onion and a medium-rare sirloin were coming your way. The whole vibe — fake Australian decor, that warm bread, the slightly mysterious menu — it worked. Millions of Americans built memories around those booths.
But something shifted. And if you’ve been to an Outback recently, you probably already know what I’m talking about. The steaks aren’t what they used to be. The prices don’t match what’s on the plate. The service feels off. And the company behind it all is bleeding money, closing locations, and scrambling to figure out what went wrong.
The Prices Went Up While The Quality Went Down
Let’s start with the thing that hits your wallet first. Between 2020 and 2025, menu prices at Outback jumped an average of 29%. That’s not a small bump. That’s the kind of increase that turns a casual weeknight dinner into a budget conversation. Chicken tenders and a salad — a meal that used to feel like a no-brainer — now runs close to $20. A 13-ounce ribeye? $27.99. For comparison, Texas Roadhouse gives you a 14-ounce ribeye for $25.49. LongHorn sells a comparable steak for $26.49. You’re paying more at Outback and getting less meat.
And it’s not just the steak. Upcharges are everywhere — appetizers, mains, desserts. Some steak and seafood plates push past $30. During COVID, Outback raised prices while quietly shrinking portions, which is the exact combination that makes people stop coming back. You can get away with raising prices if the food is great. You can get away with smaller portions if the price is right. You can’t do both and expect nobody to notice.
Steaks That Taste Like Rubber
This is the one that really stings for longtime fans. Outback built its entire identity around steaks. That was the thing. And now people are going online in droves to say the steaks are terrible.
One Reddit thread asked what happened to the quality, and a customer described the steak as “the worst I’ve ever had” — comparing it to rubber. In a comparison of chain steakhouse ribeyes based on customer feedback, Outback came in dead last. People said their steaks were tough and dry, which is something a ribeye should never be. A ribeye has natural marbling. It’s supposed to be the forgiving cut. If you’re messing up a ribeye, something is fundamentally broken.
Part of the issue is that Outback uses USDA Choice beef rather than USDA Prime. Choice is a perfectly fine grade — most steakhouse chains use it — but it has less marbling, which means it’s less forgiving when it’s overcooked. And based on the wave of complaints about overcooked steaks, that’s happening a lot. Some employees have said on social media that the company has had issues with its beef supplier’s quality for years. Others confirmed that recipes have changed, which explains why the Steakhouse Mac & Cheese, the Aussie Cobb Salad, and the Sydney Shrooms all taste different now — blander, more processed.
The Service Problem Nobody Wants To Address
A woman in Florida went viral on TikTok after sharing her lunch break disaster at Outback. She and two coworkers went in expecting quick service — they’d been regulars. She ordered a sweet tea. It wasn’t sweet. She asked for sugar packets. They never came. The three of them sat for 45 minutes waiting for food in a restaurant that wasn’t even busy. No sense of urgency from anyone on staff. They had to ask for everything to be boxed up so they could get back to work. When she opened her food at her desk, the mashed potatoes were missing. Just a steak. Eaten with plastic utensils at a desk. The video got over 257,500 views.
On Trustpilot, where Outback holds a 2.7 out of 5 rating, the stories are similar. One reviewer said a server forgot his wife’s entire meal — it showed up 20 minutes after everyone else had already eaten. Another described “very unprofessional” service, a server who was too busy chatting with other tables, steaks that looked like they’d been sitting out, and a wait time of over an hour. That table’s bill? $140 before tip. And they couldn’t even redeem a promotional deal they’d come in for. These aren’t isolated incidents. Across TikTok, Reddit, and Trustpilot, the same complaints keep showing up: slow service, missing items, distracted staff.
Closing Restaurants With No Warning
In October, Bloomin’ Brands — Outback’s parent company — abruptly closed 21 restaurants. Not a gradual wind-down. Not a heads-up to loyal customers. Overnight closures. Locations that had been open for decades just gone. Staff showed up to locked doors.
The shutdowns hit six states: Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Maryland, New York, and Wisconsin. Specific locations included a long-running spot on U.S. 280 in Birmingham, a Naples restaurant on U.S. 41 North, and the Madison, Wisconsin location on E. Towne Boulevard. On top of those 21, another 22 locations across Bloomin’ Brands’ portfolio — which also includes Carrabba’s Italian Grill and Bonefish Grill — won’t have their leases renewed and will close within the next four years.
At its peak, Outback had around 750 U.S. locations. It’s now down to about 670. That’s roughly a 10% drop in a decade. Bloomin’ Brands took a $33 million impairment charge for the closures and suspended its shareholder dividend to fund whatever comes next.
The Money Situation Is Bad
The financial picture behind Outback isn’t pretty. In 2024, Bloomin’ Brands saw earnings drop by 30%. The company pulled more than $600 million from a $1.2 billion line of credit. Same-store sales at Outback declined for five straight quarters. The most recent quarter finally showed a tiny uptick — a 0.4% rise — but that’s nothing compared to the competition. LongHorn Steakhouse posted a 5.5% increase in same-store sales. Texas Roadhouse? A 5.8% jump. While Outback barely crawled out of negative territory, its two biggest rivals were growing fast.
And those rivals have figured out what Outback hasn’t. Texas Roadhouse kept prices lower on most items, offered free peanuts, warm bread rolls with honey cinnamon butter, and even the occasional line dance from waitstaff. LongHorn leaned into an upscale-dining feel with bigger steaks at comparable prices. Both chains made customers feel like they were getting more than they paid for. Outback made customers feel the opposite.
How A Menu Got Too Big For Its Own Good
Outback’s original identity was steaks with a quirky Australian twist — “Ribs on the Barbie,” “Walkabout Soup,” the Bloomin’ Onion. Over time, the menu ballooned. More casual fare, more limited-time promotions, more complexity in the kitchen. The chain was running promotional offers every 10 to 12 weeks, creating a cycle that temporarily drove foot traffic but burned out staff and hurt profit margins. CEO Mike Spanos admitted it himself: “We were featuring items in short promotional periods that created complexity for our operators and we failed to drive value in our core menu items.”
Now the plan is to slash the menu by nearly 20%. Unpopular items go first, along with anything that’s complicated to make. COO Mike Spanos has said the goal is to “make fewer items, but make those much better.” Instead of rotating discount deals, Outback will try to build permanent value into the menu — starting with a $14.99 three-course meal, which was apparently the chain’s most successful promotion of 2024. Beloved items have already vanished, though. The Steakhouse Quesadilla, the Chicken Tender Platter, and several signature desserts are gone. Fans weren’t quiet about it on social media.
The Turnaround Plan Sounds Good On Paper
Bloomin’ Brands is calling this a “comprehensive turnaround strategy.” They brought in Spanos — formerly the COO of Delta Air Lines — as the new CEO in September 2024 despite him having zero restaurant industry experience. He replaced Dave Deno, who retired. The plan involves remodeling all remaining restaurants by the end of 2028, with brighter interiors, redesigned bars, smaller kitchens, and expanded pickup areas. New openings are slowing way down while the company redirects money toward fixing what already exists.
The company is also reportedly working with suppliers to improve beef quality and retraining employees on the entire cooking process. If overcooked steaks are the number one complaint — and they are — that’s at least a logical place to start. Spanos told shareholders, “We are not where we want to be,” which is maybe the most honest thing a CEO has said in an earnings call in a while.
But here’s the thing. An activist investor called Starboard Value started pressuring Bloomin’ Brands back in 2023 to get its act together. It’s now 2025 and the turnaround is just getting started. Meanwhile, LongHorn has overtaken Outback in sales. Texas Roadhouse has overtaken Outback in sales. Outback is still technically the largest steak chain in the country by number of locations — but that stat feels more like a leftover than an accomplishment.
The brand has “incredible equity,” Spanos says. He’s right about that. Millions of Americans grew up going to Outback. The Bloomin’ Onion is an icon. The nostalgia is real. But nostalgia doesn’t keep restaurants open. The food has to be good, the prices have to make sense, and the experience has to be worth leaving your house for. Right now, for a lot of people, it just isn’t.
