Posted on 08/21/2025 1:59:32 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
The fallout from Cracker Barrel's logo change and restaurant makeover isn't over. Shares of the food chain plunged Thursday as customer backlash and investor unease drove the chain’s worst losing streak in months.
Shares of Cracker Barrel (CBRL) tumbled more than 12% on Thursday, the steepest drop since April.
The stock, down 16.47%, is on pace for its worst five-day stretch since Feb. 14, when it dropped 17.7%. Cracker Barrel’s stock fell to $52, down more than $6, or about 11%, marking its lowest level since mid-June. Shares gained slightly to $53.48 by the afternoon.
Since May, Cracker Barrel, beloved for its Southern comfort food, front-porch rocking chairs and gift shop filled with knickknacks and old-fashioned sweets, has embarked on a $700 million transformation across its 660-plus restaurants.
The sweeping makeover includes "decluttered" dining rooms, a revamped menu and other changes aimed at updating a brand long rooted in nostalgia.
On Tuesday, the brand unveiled its new logo, which drops an illustration of a man resting his arm on top of a wooden barrel, a folksy image that has embodied the brand's southern hospitality for the last 56 years.
Cracker Barrel described the new logo as squarely anchored on the brand's "signature gold and brown tones" while incorporating "the iconic barrel shape and word mark that started it all," the company said in a statement.
The statement added that "farm fresh scrambled eggs and buttermilk biscuits" served as inspiration behind the "hues of a refreshed color palette."
Critics say the rebrand is a risky move for a company already struggling with thin margins.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxbusiness.com ...
It is, but in my experience in most places breakfast at Waffle House costs about the same with (at least in the past) CB having better quality.
The drop is quality has been going on for a bit and every menu item and process is optimized for cost savings.
CB = Crap Bucket
I don’t think it’s the sign as much as new interior decor. As cozy and comfy as an operating room.
Should have just renamed it Honkie Barrel..
A Rainbow Eatery….
We never order beverages in a restaurant unless we’re on long road trips and need coffee.
“Modernizing” a business which is rooted in nostalgia is risky.
They should modernize but stay with retro and Southern, simple, home cooked type food.
It’s a place you go to eat in lei of eating at home.
Lots of folks that were young in the 80s could be targeted perhaps... Not sure if they serve booze. That could be explored - the whole micro brewery and quality local beers. But they need to be careful.
I eat there.
I do NOT go there so I can Eat Asian fusion, see a sports team on a jumbo TV, or have LGBTQIA rainbows shoved in my face.
Not just woke, but stupid and woke.
Must have gone to the same school as Bud Light's vice president of marketing
It was more likely the overwhelming number of stories out there about lousy food and horrible service.
The logo thing is nothing but lipstick on the pig.
Bad move and will NOT survive.
Boycott Cracker Barrel until they reinstate the old cracker and his barrel. pic.twitter.com/mwGaKWMnb7— Planet Of Memes (@PlanetOfMemes) August 20, 2025
They should get rid of the racist, hurtful and targeting name too.
Their gimmick - what differentiated the chain from the competition - was folksy, laid-back rural ambience with old-fashioned cuisine. How much of that is being discarded is going to be critical and management hasn't managed to communicate that yet. Changing to something is always more saleable than changing from something. IMHO, of course.
I’ve been a CEO and on the board of directors in multiple public companies.
If I did something that caused my stock to drop 17% TWICE in six months, I would have been out on my ass so fast I’d have lost my shoes.
The fact that she is still there tells me this is intentional destruction of the company, for reasons unknown.
Lots of things can be involved, for example, once I was aware of a chain store that was driven into the ground because its model had, since the 1960s, required the stores purchase the land/building where they operated.
As a result, it was sitting on corner lots throughout many cities that were far more valuable than the chain itself.
It was pushed to near bankruptcy so it would divest the stores (and the lots could be snapped up by an insider).
I would not be surprised if the same thing is happening here.
The CEO is claiming customers want this.
Stock prices and feed back say otherwise.
we pulled over b/c traffic was at a standstill. We never ate at CB before, and haven’t since. Those prices are ridiculous.
I hear the food sucks of late. I have personally never been to one. And I used to travel for work but I always found local/mom pop joints to eat at or cooked my own when I was able to.
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