At left, back is Todd Bielewski and his daughter Lauren, 2 years old, and at right is April Colombu with her dog Nevada Sky at Chow Lafayette which is a restaurant listed as one of the top 100 bay area restaurants. (Photo By Liz Hafalia/The San Franc …
Ditch the kids, bring the dogs. That’s the message from diners who overwhelmingly want to eat at places where they do not have to worry about children interrupting their meals.
Interestingly, while the youngsters may not be welcome, a large portion of customers did wish they had more chances to pull up a seat for their four-legged friends.
By the numbers:
Three-quarters of diners wished restaurants had more adults-only options, according to a new survey. Interestingly, the ones most likely to want the choice are the ones with kids of their own.
Most of the would-be customers did not necessarily want the restaurants to be completely child-free and half of them acknowledged that the setting mattered, but just over a quarter of them (26%) did say they would support the idea outright.
The most popular ways to enact such policies would be to ban children late at night (49%) or have a dedicated adults-only section (46%), the survey, which was conducted by Lightspeed Commerce, indicated. Just as many also liked the idea of keeping kids away from romantic settings (46%) and from places that serve alcohol (43%).
What they're saying:
"The clearest signal in the data is that adults-only dining is no longer a niche concept tied to luxury or exclusivity," Adoniram Sides, Lightspeed’s senior vice president of hospitality product, told Fox News Digital.
"What's particularly striking is that parents are even more supportive than non-parents, suggesting this trend is being driven less by frustration with children and more by changing expectations around how people want to socialize and spend their nights out."
Fur Babies > Babies
While kids are not always welcome, man’s best friend is finding a seat at the table. The survey found that nearly half of overall restaurant goers (45%) support letting people bring their dogs to the diner, and 1 in 6 say it does not matter if it is an indoor or outdoor establishment. Twenty-nine percent were on board if it was an outdoor-only policy.
Pollsters noted a definite generation gap among those willing to dine with the dogs. Among Baby Boomers, just over a third (35%) liked the idea, while nearly two-thirds of Gen Z respondents were on-board.
Dig deeper:
That was not the only difference between Gen Z and their elders. According to the survey, more than half of them (56%) would rather dig into a family-style meal so they can try more things, and that’s more than four times higher than the number who want a dish all to themselves.
In addition to sharing meals, when Gen Z go out on dates, they are also more likely to share the bill. Thirty percent of them say they will split the bill, nearly twice as many as the Millennials who came before them, and way more than Generation X.
What they're saying:
"Today’s consumers are looking for dining experiences that feel more personalized, health-conscious and flexible, whether that means protein-focused menus, shared plates, pet-friendly spaces or more curated environments tailored to different occasions," Lightspeed founder Dax Dasilva explained. "Restaurants are adapting to a generation of diners with very different expectations around food, atmosphere and social experiences."
The backstory:
The Lightspeed survey was part of its 2026 State of Hospitality report and spanned consumers in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and Belgium.
The Source: Information for this article was taken from Lightspeed Commerce. This story was reported from Orlando.