Red Lobster closes more restaurants in 'right-sizing' effort

Red Lobster has closed dozens of restaurants this year as it continues to prune weak locations following its 2024 bankruptcy.

As of Tuesday, the seafood chain’s website listed 484 locations nationwide, 36 fewer than the 520 it had at the end of 2025, according to Technomic data. That’s a decrease of 7%.

The closures have come in bunches and have included several long-running and high-profile locations. Last month, the Red Lobster in Columbus, Georgia, shut down after 55 years, and in June, the chain pulled the plug on its Times Square outpost after 23 years.

In recent weeks, Red Lobster has closed three locations in Alabama, two in Illinois, and one in California, per local media reports.

The chain’s footprint is now about 25% smaller than it was at the end of 2023, before it began closing a large number of locations leading up to its bankruptcy filing in May 2024. It has continued to close restaurants since then in an effort to shed unprofitable stores, some of them burdened by expensive leases.

The closures are not a surprise. Red Lobster CEO Damola Adamolekun said earlier this year that the chain needed to get smaller, and the company reiterated Tuesday that closing underperforming restaurants remains part of its long-term growth strategy.

“This isn’t a step back, it’s how we build forward,” the company said.

Orlando-based Red Lobster, still the nation’s largest seafood chain by both sales and unit count, reached a peak of 679 locations in 2019, according to Technomic. In bankruptcy filings, it acknowledged that it had overexpanded, which contributed to some of its sales and traffic troubles in recent years.

It has also been particularly challenged by rent costs, the result of then-owner Golden Gate Capital's decision to sell much of the company’s real estate in 2014 and lease it back from the buyers.

The now-smaller chain has been working to bring customers back into its restaurants with promotions like Endless Shrimp, a revamp of the all-you-can-eat Ultimate Endless Shrimp deal that helped push Red Lobster into bankruptcy. It has also worked to improve service with an initiative called Red Carpet Hospitality, and it has begun remodeling restaurants with a fresher, more contemporary look.

It’s not clear what impact these efforts have had, though Red Lobster said earlier this year that it was tracking ahead of its revenue and earnings forecasts for the year.

“Right-sizing our footprint strengthens the brand and enables things like more restaurant refreshes and a stronger guest experience at the locations built to carry this brand's future, putting Red Lobster on solid ground for sustainable growth, now and for the long term,” the company said in this week's statement.

And though Red Lobster is mainly focused on getting more out of its existing restaurants right now, it does plan to open new locations again, eventually.

“As we continue building momentum, we absolutely expect new restaurants to be part of Red Lobster’s future,” Kristen Briede, chief global development officer, said in a July interview.

CORRECTION: A previous version of this story said Red Lobster had 468 U.S. locations. It has 484. NRN regrets the error.