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LivingSocial survey: Lunch is most popular dine-out opportunity

September 14, 2011

LivingSocial has released results from its first "Dining Out" survey of consumer behavior. The research was conducted among 4,000 Americans by Mandala Research.

Notable results include:

• The average American eats 4.8 meals per week in restaurants or 249 total restaurant meals per year (both dining in and carry out).
• The most popular restaurant meal is lunch, with 2.6 eaten on average each week (both carryout and dining), followed by sit down dinners (1.4 per week) and brunch/breakfast (.8 per week).
• Nearly half of respondents (45 percent) described themselves as "meat lovers," 22 percent as a "sweet tooth," and 19 percent as "fast food junkies.
• By comparison, just 18 percent described themselves as "health nuts" and 5 percent as "vegetarians or vegans."
• More than one in three respondents (35 percent) described themselves as "experimental eaters," 25 percent as "foodies," and 11 percent as "locavores."
• Although the food truck trend continues to grow http://www.qsrweb.com/article/184285/Food-truck-segment-speeding-up, just 4 percent of respondents said they regularly eat at one.

Best and worst dining out cities, cuisines

When respondents were asked to rank their city's dining scene, New York, Chicago and San Francisco finished in the top three slots. Houston, Dallas, and Washington, DC rounded out the top six.

The worst dining out cities in the U.S. were Seattle, Sacramento and Detroit.

Respondents said they frequently eat Italian (65 percent), Mexican (62 percent), Chinese (59 percent) and Pizza (58 percent) more than 22 other types of cuisine included on the survey.

When asked which new type of restaurant they'd most recently tried, Thai finished No. 1, beating out 25 other types of cuisine. Other top finishers among new cuisines tried by respondents included seafood, Sushi, Greek, BBQ and Indian foods.

"As a leader in local commerce, LivingSocial has its finger on the pulse the hottest trends in more than 575 markets worldwide," said Amy Wolf, LivingSocial local trend expert. "The Dining Out survey gives us additional insight into local markets so that we can not only continue to bring our members great values on the deals they want, but also help merchants determine the deals that will be most successful for their business."

Read more about trends and statistics.