WASHINGTON (AP) — Long past its painful peak, inflation in the United States may be heading steadily back toward its pre-pandemic levels, without the need for further interest rate hikes by the Federal Reserve.

Such a scenario became more likely, if hardly guaranteed, after Tuesday’s surprisingly tame report on consumer prices for October. The Labor Department’s data showed a broad-based easing of inflation across most goods and services. The price of gas? Down. Appliances? Down. Autos? Down. Same for airfares, hotel rooms and doctors’ fees.

Overall inflation didn’t rise from September to October, the first time that consumer prices collectively haven’t budged from one month to another in more than a year. Compared with a year earlier, prices rose 3.2% in October, the smallest such rise since June, though still above the Fed’s 2% inflation target.

Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so-called core inflation was just 0.2% last month, slightly below the pace of the previous two months. Economists closely track core prices, which are thought to provide a good sign of inflation’s likely future path. Measured year over year, core prices rose 4% in October, down from 4.1% in September, the smallest rise in two years.

“The inflation fever has broken,” said Bill Adams, chief economist at Comerica Bank. “Rising petroleum production is holding down gas prices, house prices are rising more slowly after mortgage rates surged in 2023 and rents are also rising more gradually” as more apartment buildings are completed.

October’s milder-than-expected price figures make it much less likely that the Fed will impose another rate hike. Many economists now say that the Fed’s most likely next move will be to cut rates, likely sometime next year, though that would depend on whether inflation continues to cool.

A major factor has been a big improvement in the supply of many things — workers, housing and components for manufactured goods.

Millions of Americans have come off the sidelines in the past year and flooded back into the workforce, seeking and (mostly) finding jobs. Immigration has increased, too, and with it more people looking for work. With more hires available, businesses haven’t had to raise wages as much to fill jobs, thereby easing the pressure on those businesses to raise their prices.

At the same time, the largest number of new apartment buildings nationwide in decades are being completed, a trend that is helping slow rent increases. Rental costs, after a spike in September, rose at a much more gradual pace last month.

Rents and other housing costs are likely to keep coming down, economists say, as the cost of new leases continues to fall, according to real-time data providers such as Zillow. Those lower prices show up in the government’s data with a lag.

And the supply chains that were badly snarled during the pandemic have pretty much unwound. An ample availability of products, parts and components help keep a lid on their prices. Automakers, for example, are having a much easier time finding semiconductors.

Partly as a result, new car prices declined last month, defying fears that the now-settled autoworkers’ strike would reduce dealers’ inventories and send prices higher. Used car prices, too, are down. They fell for a fifth straight month in October and have tumbled 7% from a year ago.

“We’re finally undoing that and getting the benefits,” Austan Goolsbee, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, said Tuesday in remarks at the Detroit Economic Club.

Separately, consumers are widely expected to pull back on spending after a blowout summer, with credit card debts — and delinquencies — rising and average savings falling. Cooler demand should force businesses to compete more on price.

Gas costs have kept falling this month, with the national average price at the pump averaging $3.35 Tuesday, down 42 cents from a year earlier. Those prices declines could push overall inflation, measured year-over-year, below 3% by December.

Yes, inflation is still painfully apparent in many areas. They include auto and health insurance and some groceries, like beef and bread.

The average cost of auto insurance, which jumped 1.9% just from September to October, has soared nearly 20% from a year earlier. As new and used vehicles have grown more expensive, so has the cost of insuring them. And health insurance prices rose 1.1% last month, though that was largely due to a change in the government’s methodology.

But even as overall price increases slow, it doesn’t mean inflation is reversing or that most prices are falling back to pre-pandemic levels. The consumer price index, the most widely followed measure of inflation, remains about 20% higher than it was before the pandemic.

Milk prices, which have ticked down compared with the past year, are still 23% higher than they were pre-pandemic. Ground beef prices are 31% higher. Gas prices, despite a steep decline from a year ago, are still 46% higher than before the pandemic.

Many economists say a key reason why so many Americans hold a gloomy view of the economy despite very low unemployment and steady hiring is that these prices — on items that they buy regularly — remain much higher than they were three years ago.

Barring a deep and painful recession, prices aren’t going to fall to their pre-pandemic levels. Instead, economists say, Americans’ wages need to rise to help pay for the higher costs.

Wages and salaries trailed inflation in 2021 and 2022, exacerbating the pain of higher prices. Yet this year, as inflation has cooled, average pay has pulled ahead of inflation. By most measures, average paychecks, adjusted for inflation, are back to where they were before the pandemic.

Yet that essentially means that Americans, on average, have had scant real pay increases compared with three years ago. And while average pay may be back to pre-pandemic levels, many people have received below-average pay raises and are still behind inflation.

The Fed will likely welcome Tuesday’s report as evidence of further progress toward getting inflation back to its target of 2%. Fed officials, led by Chair Jerome Powell, are considering whether their benchmark rate is high enough to quell inflation or if they need to impose another increase in coming months.

Powell had said last week that Fed officials were “not confident” that rates were sufficiently high to tame inflation. The Fed has raised its benchmark interest rate 11 times in the past year and a half, to about 5.4%, the highest level in 22 years.

But the central bank has raised its key rate just once since May. Since its last meeting on Nov. 1, a government report showed that hiring cooled in October compared with September, and wage growth slowed, thereby easing pressure on companies to raise prices in the coming months.

Adams, the Comerica economist, said he thinks the Fed’s most likely next move will be to cut rates, likely by mid-2024.

The prospect that the Fed may end its rate hike campaign and eventually cut rates ignited a stock market rally Tuesday. The Dow Jones industrial average soared nearly 1.4% in mid-afternoon trading. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note fell to 4.46%, down from nearly 4.6%, reflecting investors’ expectations that borrowing rates will decline.

The Fed’s rate hikes have increased the costs of mortgages, auto loans, credit cards and many forms of business borrowing, part of a concerted drive to slow growth and cool inflation pressures. The central bank is trying to achieve a “soft landing” — raising borrowing costs just enough to curb inflation without tipping the economy into a deep recession.

“Things are proceeding in a way that is very consistent with what (the Fed) would want to see,” said Eric Winograd, chief economist at AB Global, an asset management firm. “They look like they are on course to generate a soft landing. There’s no guarantee that they will actually manage to accomplish it. But right now, that’s the story that the data are telling.”

An eviction order from the Clerk of the County Court on Oct. 25 directed the Orange County Sheriff’s Office to remove Rockwater Development LLC,  which does business as Outpost, and “all persons” from 111 S. Orlando Ave. suites A and B in Maitland, the records show.

In a Facebook post Friday, the restaurant said the eviction happened Thursday and the business was closed.

“As you can imagine, we are currently trying to navigate the surprise of the events that occurred yesterday,” the post said. “The morning started out with a gas leak, and then, despite months of re-negotiations with our landlord, ended when they closed our doors.

“Between that, and not being able to recover from the expenses of opening during a pandemic and then this extraordinarily slow summer, it is with an extremely heavy heart that we are forced to close our family business,” the post read.

A sign on the restaurant’s door Friday advertised the space as available for lease.

The court file also contained a complaint from April that claimed the landlord was owed more than $64,000 for rent. A circuit judge in May ruled the landlord was entitled to recover the property and directed the Clerk of the Court to issue the eviction order.

No one answered the restaurant’s phone on Friday and an emailed list of questions was not immediately answered.

Outpost signed a deal in 2019 to become an anchor restaurant tenant in the Maitland City Centre project after deciding to close its location on Edgewater Drive in Orlando’s College Park neighborhood. The restaurant originally opened in 2015.

The Orange County Sheriff’s Office said in an unsigned statement the agency is responsible for carrying out the eviction, but there would not be a report filed for something like that.

Thailand-based seafood supplier Thai Union said in an earnings report that Red Lobster’s share of loss from operations got worse in the quarter ending Sept. 30. Converted from Thai currency in November, the loss went from about $9.5 million last year to about $11.1 million this year.

Red Lobster’s move at the end of June to start serving its Ultimate Endless Shrimp promotion every day also didn’t appear to make as big a wave as what was expected from the investor. 

A webcast slideshow from Thai Union said the deal did drive some traffic growth but fell short of expectations and financial performance.

San Diego-based restaurant analyst John Gordon said the deal’s $20 price was too high, noting Olive Garden’s Never Ending Pasta Bowl promotion starts at $13.99.

“The marketing effort to do this floundered,” Gordon said. “The new CEO is already in place. So they’ve got to try again. They’ve got to try something else that works.That was a reasonable effort on the shrimp, for a fish house to do that, but they’ve got to try something else.”

After nearly a year and a half without a CEO, Red Lobster in September named longtime executive Horace Dawson to the top position. Dawson had been the chain’s executive vice president and general counsel since 2014.

Thai Union’s report, released Monday, attributed the quarter’s loss to “industry headwinds, including higher material and labor costs, high interest rates, and a cyclically lower quarter.”

Gordon said that Red Lobster’s bigger loss compared with last year was not all that material of a shift in terms of dollar amount.

“The casual dining space is still burdened with some inflation,” Gordon said.

Restaurant operators have reported declines in customer traffic for six consecutive months, according to the National Restaurant Association’s September Restaurant Performance Index.

A Red Lobster spokeswoman did not immediately respond to questions from the Orlando Sentinel.

Conditions had been improving at Red Lobster, with Thai Union reporting a “share of profit from operations” for Red Lobster in the first quarter of this year. In the second quarter, its share of loss from operations in Red Lobster decreased by 66% compared with the same time last year.

Thai Union, whose brands include Chicken of the Sea tuna, became a Red Lobster stakeholder in 2016 before teaming up with a group of investors in 2020 to acquire the rest of the company.

afuller@orlandosentinel.com 

In a statement, Seminole spokesman Gary Bitner said the tribe was “offering limited access to existing Florida customers to test its Hard Rock Bet platform.” A page on the app offers potential “early access” to those who placed a sports bet with Hard Rock in 2021 or were members of its Unity loyalty program, and some accounts dating to that period were able to be activated.

An attempt to create a new account on the Hard Rock Bet app resulted in a page stating, “We couldn’t verify your identity,” adding that customer support staff would follow up within 24 to 48 hours.

The move was an unexpected one, said Bob Jarvis, a law professor and gambling expert at Nova Southeastern University in Davie, especially after the tribe revealed last week that gamblers will be able to place sports bets in person at their six casinos starting in December, as well as for craps and roulette, without mentioning online wagering.

“That was already a bold move, given that the lawsuits are still going on both in the federal courts and the state courts,” Jarvis said, “… It doesn’t make any sense, frankly, for them to be doing this while there are still judges and justices who are yet to weigh in on the legality of mobile sports betting.”

The 2021 gambling pact brokered by Gov. Ron DeSantis allowed the Seminoles to offer online wagering to anyone 21 or older within the boundaries of Florida, due to the servers being located on tribal land. Location software would determine whether a gambler is, in fact, in Florida.

In exchange, the Seminoles agreed to pay $2.5 billion to the state over the next five years and potentially billions more in the future.

But two competing gambling operators — West Flagler Associates and Bonita-Fort Myers Corp. — filed a federal lawsuit arguing the deal violates the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act by allowing gambling outside of tribal lands, despite the servers’ location.

A separate lawsuit before the state Supreme Court focuses on an amendment to the Florida Constitution that requires voters to approve any expansion of gambling in the state.

The suits led to a pause in online wagering after the Hard Rock app had been active for just 34 days in 2021.

Jarvis said he expected one or more of the plaintiffs to ask the state Supreme Court for a stay that would again force the tribe to shut down the app. But the decision to launch it amid the legal battle could indicate a new strategy, he said.

“It was my assumption all along that the Seminoles were being very patient and that they would not want to do anything that would jeopardize their chances in either the federal courts or the state courts,” Jarvis said. “This is just a completely different approach.”

But, he said, “There is a theory that … you are better off being up and running because it is harder for a court to stop a business that is up and running because, of course, it impacts both workers and customers. So maybe that’s the Seminoles’ thinking.”

John Sowinski, who heads the anti-gambling organization No Casinos that filed a brief supporting the Florida lawsuit, said the state and the tribe “can’t rely on this bogus argument that someone wagering on an iPhone in downtown Orlando is actually [making a bet] taking place on tribal lands.”

He said he did not know if the plaintiffs would ask for a stay, however. Attorneys for West Flagler did not return a request for comment.

After a favorable court ruling in June, the Twitter/X account for Hard Rock Sportsbook, part of the casino chain owned by the tribe, posted a video of WWE wrestler The Undertaker, thought “dead,” opening his eyes.

On Tuesday, the account posted a video of The Undertaker bursting out of his coffin.

The massive expansion is coming after Denny’s purchased Keke’s, which originated in 2006 on Conroy Road, for $82.5 million last year.

Keke’s has 56 restaurants, but Denny’s CEO Kelli Valade revealed there are 14 agreements with franchisees to open 100 more locations of the breakfast and lunch eatery. Eleven of those deals are with Denny’s franchisees.

The first Keke’s outside Florida is being built in Nashville.

“Their aim from the get-go was, ‘We don’t want this to remain a Florida-only concept,'” said Mark Kalinowski, president and CEO of Kalinowski Equity Research, which follows Denny’s and the restaurant industry. “The Denny’s concept itself is mature, so this is a way for them to have a vehicle that, if it works, could be a growth vehicle for years to come in terms of restaurants.”

Keke’s has also unveiled a new menu with fewer items, which reduces complexity in the kitchen and allows the chain to show off its ingredients, Valade said on an earnings call Monday.

“We’re leaning into that Keke’s special sauce to ensure that as we grow, we continue to demonstrate a differentiated offering to all of our guests through the new tagline, ‘Mornings from scratch,'” said Valade, also the former CEO of Orlando-based Red Lobster.

Keke’s, open 7 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. daily, serves waffles, omelets, paninis and other breakfast and lunch fare.

Lynn Desjarlais, a Keke’s fan who visits the chain two or three times a month, said the new menu makes a lot more sense.

“While the menu may be smaller, it doesn’t appear that way because the options that they’ve provided are still the same and more customizable,” Desjarlais said.

The 40-year-old Windermere resident, who even named her cat Keke, said there are about five or six Keke’s around Central Florida where she dines. She’s had no issues yet with how Denny’s runs the chain.

“I have not noticed any negative changes in terms of service, food quality, quantity,” Desjarlais said. “Everything has remained the same as always: great.”

The company believes there are opportunities to open more than one Keke’s in Nashville, according to an unsigned statement from Denny’s in response to questions from the Orlando Sentinel.

“Nashville was selected as the first Keke’s Breakfast Café market outside of Florida because of its growing economy and relatively friendly business environment,” the statement said. “We also believe the breakfast space is underserved in Nashville.”

Keke’s will be “quickly following” the Tennessee expansion into neighboring states as well as places like Texas and California where there are strong Denny’s franchisees.

Kalinowski said 100 restaurants was a surprising figure, but it shows franchisees are looking at the opportunities for the brand outside of its home state.

“Keke’s isn’t a huge concept. It’s not McDonald’s. It’s not Taco Bell,” Kalinowski said. “It’s still unproven outside of Florida, and no one knows for certain how it’s going to do, but these franchisees are stepping up.”

afuller@orlandosentinel.com

Segrest Farm workers scooped the fish into plastic bags filled with sedatives to calm them ahead of a journey to a Petco store across the country. Then the fish were loaded into insulated cardboard boxes with words in red reading “LIVE TROPICAL FISH” with arrows pointing up.

“If you’ve flown out of Tampa or Miami or Orlando, you’ve probably flown with our fish,” said Segrest Farms brand manager Shelby Stenstrud.

Segrest Farms is among the largest wholesalers of aquarium fish in the United States with 6,000 tanks inside a Gibsonton distribution center. And it’s one of a hundred facilities in Florida that raise and collect fish for pet shops.

While Tampa Bay is known for its oranges and strawberries, aquarium fish have also been one of the region’s prized exports for decades.

Most tropical fish raised in the U.S. come from Florida. The state makes up more than 40% of the nation’s sales, according to federal data, with Hillsborough County priding itself as the “heart of the tropical aquaculture industry.” The tropical fish farm industry had a $172 million economic impact in Florida in 2021, according to a 2021 University of Florida survey.

“You could drive by and you’d never know that you’re looking at a fish farm,” said Segrest Farms president Sandy Moore.
The birth of “Tampa’s oddest industry”

The region’s aquarium roots date back as early as the 1930s, when keeping fish as pets was a growing phenomenon.
Albert Greenberg, the “father of Florida’s aquaculture industry” and inducted to the state’s Agricultural Hall of Fame in 2007, picked Tampa in 1930 to open a tropical fish farm and pioneered raising them in dirt ponds.

His farm sent fish across the world in tin cans and Thermos bottles, according to a Tampa Tribune article in 1934 that called it “Tampa’s oddest industry.”

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“It’ll last,” Greenberg told the Tampa Tribune about the rise of pet fish. “Because, as you know, people must have pets. In cities, it’s difficult to keep a cat or a dog and birds require daily attention. Tropical fish, more or less, take care of themselves, and they always have a show for you.”

Region’s booming fish farm era

By the 1950s, south Hillsborough became renowned for its fish farms. Ruskin was considered the “tropical fish capital of the world,” according to newspaper archives. Because of the Tampa Bay’s tropical climate, easy access to airports and cheap real estate compared to Miami, it became a key destination for fish farmers looking to expand.

To this day, Florida still has the most fish farms in the U.S. Florida recorded 109 fish farms, according to the U.S Department of Agriculture census of aquaculture conducted in 2018. Most are concentrated in Hillsborough, Polk and Miami-Dade counties. The next largest states, Hawaii and Texas, only had 15 each.

By 1996, the UF established an aquaculture research hub in Ruskin to support the fish farm industry. There, researchers look into mitigating disease spread and how to breed new species for commercial selling, said Matthew DiMaggio, director of the UF Tropical Aquaculture Laboratory.

“They can come to us and ask us that and we can design experiments around that, essentially give them a protocol or like a recipe … These are the things that you should follow to hopefully make the most profit for you,” DiMaggio said.

The lab was the first to raise Blue Tangs for commercialization. Before, to have the saltwater fish that inspired the Dory character in Pixar’s Finding Nemo franchise in an aquarium, they had to be wild-caught. Now the lab’s industry partners are learning to farm them.

“The more new species, new products that we can bring to market is more profit for the farmers and for the state,” DiMaggio said. “It helps the industry to diversify and become more resilient.”

How are they farmed?

At Segrest Farms, open since 1961, workers care for approximately a million fish each week.

How they’re farmed can depend on the species, but mostly, the farmers put the male and female fish into a tank mimicking water conditions prime for mating. Then they wait for the eggs.

The eggs are later moved into a 20,000-gallon pond outdoors that can hold about 10,000 to 50,000 fish. Once they’re hatched and grown into adolescents — a process taking about three to six months — the fish are harvested and sent to stores.

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About 40% is farmed directly in Florida, Moore said, and the rest are shipped in from around the world to Gibsonton to be prepared for store aquariums.

Changing tides in the 21st Century

Like much of the agricultural industry in Florida over the last two decades, ornamental fish farming faces pressure from the region’s hot real estate market and cheaper international imports.

The number of fish farms in the state fell 14% between 2013 and 2018, according to the USDA aquaculture census. And that trend could continue with the next five-year census set to be released in December.

“Fortunately, or unfortunately everywhere in west central Florida has had a population explosion,” said David Boozer, executive director of the Florida Tropical Fish Farms Association based in Winter Haven. “I would say a lot of the farms were offered very good money for their land and sold out to developers.”

And many fish farms are competing against countries in Southeast Asia such as Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore which have cheaper labor costs, driving down the price of fish.

During the pandemic, Boozer said the local industry had some of its best years. People were staying at home and adopting all kinds of pets, fish included. Meanwhile, the international trade dropped dramatically.

Segrest Farms Moore said “there was so much demand during COVID — I mean tremendous demand like I haven’t seen since maybe the 80s.”

Before the pandemic, UF’s DiMaggio said Florida fish farmers had to stay in the game by finding new species to breed (like the Blue Tang) or making the fish healthier. As countries reopened, shipping costs skyrocketed and equalized some of the competition from overseas.

In short: Florida is in a position to compete in both price and quality.

“The entire industry is based on what the fish look like,” DiMaggio said. “The Florida farmers really pride themselves on producing some of the best-looking fish in the world.”

But can you take advantage of that in Florida?

Here’s what to know:

Is insurance bundling available in Florida?

• Restrictions: The bundling discount isn’t available to most homeowners in Florida, where market conditions are different than other states, ndustry experts say.

• Savings: “Typically if you bundle your home and auto insurance you could save approximately 20% on each policy, and that’s a big savings,” said Mark Friedlander, director of corporate communications for the Insurance Information Institute. “But in Florida that is very difficult because you typically need to get your auto insurance from a separate carrier than your home insurance because of the way the market is.”

That 20% discount would otherwise translate to yearly savings of more than $1,000, taking into account that homeowners in Florida are paying on average $6,000 per year, nearly four times the national average of $1,700, according to data from the institute.

Why is bundling is restricted in Florida?

• Departures: Florida’s insurance industry is going through a crisis, with companies having left the state or declared bankruptcy. The situation is limiting homeowners who want to shop around for lower premiums, especially in South Florida, where only a handful of companies are writing new policies.

Can insurance companies still in Florida write different policies?

• Limited scope: The challenge of putting all your policies in the hands of one carrier has to do with the type of company offering policies in the state.

• Regional companies: “In Florida, roughly 80% of the market is in the hands of smaller regional insurers that we call monoline insurance companies,” Friedlander said. “And monoline means that they only write one type of business, in this case just residential. They are smaller regional companies and they don’t write auto, they don’t write life or other types of insurance. So it makes it very difficult to bundle.”

• Homeowner policy cutbacks: The practice of offering multi-policy discounts was once common, said Len Bujnicki, working out of Pembroke Pines for the firm We Insure. But then the large national companies that offer multiple coverage began to trim down their homeowners portfolios after a string of Florida hurricanes in recent years.

What about other bundling in Florida?

• Other discounts: The practice still is alive and well in other parts of the business, said Bujnicki. You can still find a national company that can bundle your auto, life or motorcycle policies and save you money, but you will have a much harder time finding one willing to do the same with your homeowners in Florida, he said.

Starboard Value, which won control of Darden’s board in 2014, has about a 10% stake in Tampa-based Bloomin’ Brands. There are some similarities between Bloomin’ and Darden, and Starboard has already brought in a former Darden top executive as an adviser.

“We’re Back with Another Restaurant Conglomerate: Bloomin’ Brands,” a recent slideshow from Starboard for the Capitalize for Kids charitable investors conference declared.

The slideshow called for Outback’s marketing to get back to being fun, noting past commercials featured cowboys, surfers and football. It also said better and more consistent service and food would bring more success to the chain, which has 564 company-owned locations.

The presentation also said there is room to grow its Carrabba’s chain into the clear No. 2 behind Darden’s Olive Garden in Italian casual dining. Carrabba’s has 199 company-owned restaurants and Olive Garden has 906.

Bloomin’ also owns Bonefish Grill and Fleming’s Prime Steakhouse & Wine Bar.

When asked by the Orlando Sentinel about Starboard’s presented plan and stake in Bloomin’, as well as if the company had already changed anything to adjust to Starboard, Cathie Koch, Bloomin’ vice president of corporate affairs, said in an email that “Bloomin’ Brands has engaged with Starboard Value since it invested in the company and we have appreciated hearing their team’s views.

“We look forward to continuing a constructive dialogue as we remain focused on enhancing value for all shareholders,” Koch said.

San Diego-based restaurant analyst John Gordon doesn’t expect Starboard’s investment in Bloomin’ to be as much of a fight as its involvement with Darden turned out to be.

In Darden’s case, every board member was replaced as Starboard CEO Jeffrey Smith won a vote to put in place himself and 11 others on it in October 2014. Gene Lee was named Darden CEO in 2015 after taking on the interim role following the board replacement and longtime CEO Clarence Otis announcing his retirement in July 2014.

Otis, who was criticized for the $2.1 billion sale of Red Lobster, revealed his departure after months of fighting with investment groups about Darden’s direction, the Orlando Sentinel reported in 2015.

“I don’t think that anybody wants to go through another battle for Darden again,” Gordon said. “[Bloomin’ CEO David Deno is] a little more politically savvy … whereas Clarence had been a longtime CEO at Darden and he felt that he knew best.”

Gordon said Starboard’s Smith is a positive influence for restaurants based on his work with Darden as well as Papa John’s after the pizza company’s own troubles.

In 2015, Darden’s board approved spinning off the real estate of the Olive Garden and LongHorn Steakhouse chains. Cash from the deal was planned to help get rid of about $1 billion in debt. Starboard exited the Darden board in 2016.

Starboard’s presentation pointed out the success Darden has had since Starboard’s involvement as well as the similarities between the chains owned by Bloomin’ and Darden.

One slide was titled: “Like Outback, Olive Garden Suffered from Execution Issues Prior to Starboard’s Involvement at Darden.”

Starboard has also brought on a retired Darden executive, David George, as an adviser for its investment in Bloomin’, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission document. George retired from Darden as executive vice president and chief operating officer in August 2020.

Gordon said Starboard was a “catalyst” for Darden.

“The CEO had to exit. The board exited. A high performer [Lee] was installed as CEO,” Gordon said. “… Bloomin’ is in kind of a dead zone right now. They’re in a momentum-less mode right now. They need a catalyst in order to get their brands moving.”

Gordon described Starboard’s slideshow as a “wave-top level” look at Bloomin’ and he expects Starboard will come out with more plans.

He added that based on his own visits, Outback appears to have the same look as it has for two decades.

“No. 1, is that the look and feel of Outback isn’t conducive or friendly for lunch business, in my opinion,” Gordon said.

As for growing Carrabba’s, Gordon believes the brand needs a new approach.

“Carrabba’s is going to have to change,” Gordon said. “It’s already been middle class. So for it to zoom up, where’s it going to go? How is it going to be repositioned? They’re going to have to do the conceptual work with planners and with all kinds of folks.”

Gordon said he believes Darden could be standing in its path.

“The issue is how do you bring Carrabba’s up to Olive Garden’s strength,” Gordon said. “Olive Garden was created by Darden… it has years and years of history and tradition and successful advertising.”

“Carrabba’s can’t grow because Olive Garden is blocking their way.”

Darden spokesman Rich Jeffers said the company doesn’t comment on its competitors.

WASHINGTON (AP) — An inflation gauge that is closely monitored by the Federal Reserve showed price increases remained elevated in September amid brisk consumer spending and strong economic growth.

Friday’s report from the Commerce Department showed that prices rose 0.4% from August to September, the same as the previous month. And compared with 12 months earlier, inflation was unchanged at 3.4%.

Taken as a whole, the figures the government issued Friday show a still-surprisingly resilient consumer, willing to spend briskly enough to power the economy even in the face of persistent inflation and high interest rates. Spread across the economy, the strength of that spending is itself helping to fuel inflation.

In a cautionary note, consumers relied increasingly on savings to fuel their shopping last month. Income growth slowed. Adjusted for inflation, income actually fell slightly.

Yet spending jumped 0.4%, after adjusting for inflation. The saving rate fell to 3.4%, down from the 6%-plus average before the pandemic.

“That is clearly unsustainable, and we expect spending growth will slow sharply in the quarters ahead,” said Michael Pearce, lead U.S. economist at Oxford Economics, a consulting firm.

September’s month-to-month price increase exceeds a pace consistent with the Fed’s 2% annual inflation target, and it compounds already higher costs for such necessities as rent, food and gas. The Fed is widely expected to keep its key short-term interest rate unchanged when it meets next week. But its policymakers have flagged the risk that stronger growth could keep inflation persistently high and require further rate hikes to quell it.

Since March 2022, the central bank has raised its key rate from near zero to roughly 5.4% in a concerted drive to tame inflation. Annual inflation, as measured by the separate and more widely followed consumer price index, has tumbled from the 9.1% peak it reached in June of last year.

On Thursday, the government reported that strong consumer spending drove the economy to a robust 4.9% annual growth rate in the July-September quarter, the best such showing in nearly two years. Heavy spending by consumers typically leads businesses to charge higher prices. In Friday’s report on inflation, the government also said that consumer spending last month jumped a robust 0.7%.

Spending on services jumped, Friday’s report said, led by greater outlays for international travel, housing and utilities.

Excluding volatile food and energy costs, “core” prices rose 0.3% from August to September, above the 0.1% uptick the previous month. Compared with a year earlier, though, core inflation eased to 3.7%, the slowest rise since May 2021 and down from 3.8% in August.

A key reason why the Fed may keep rates unchanged through year’s end is that September’s 3.7% year-over-year rise in core inflation matches the central bank’s forecast for this quarter.

With core prices already at that level, Fed officials will likely believe they can “proceed carefully,” as Chair Jerome Powell has said they will do, and monitor how the economy evolves in coming months.

Still, the data in Friday’s report showed that while prices for many goods, including cars, furniture and appliances are actually falling, the price increases for services remain chronically high.

Restaurant meals, for example, rose 0.4% in price from August to September, up from a 0.2% rise the previous month. They are now 5.8% more expensive than they were a year earlier.

One measure the Fed is monitoring closely — services prices, excluding energy and housing — jumped 0.4% last month, after rising only 0.1% in August. The Fed watches that gauge because it tracks prices in a set of industries that are labor-intensive and particularly sensitive to rising wages. Higher wages can fuel inflation if businesses pass on their higher labor costs by raising prices.

A solid job market has helped fuel consumer spending, with wages and salaries having outpaced inflation for most of this year. Yet Friday’s report showed that the growth in overall income — a category that, in addition to wages, includes interest income and government payments — has slowed. Adjusted for inflation, after-tax income slipped 0.1% in September, the third straight monthly decline. Shrinking incomes could weaken spending and growth in the months ahead.

NEW YORK (AP) — About 2 in 3 Americans say their household expenses have risen over the last year, but only about 1 in 4 say their income has increased in the same period, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

As household expenses outpace earnings, many are expressing concern about their financial futures. What’s more, for most Americans, household debt has either risen in the last year or has not gone away.

Steve Shapiro, 61, who works as an audio engineer in Pittsburgh, said he’d been spending about $100 a week on groceries prior to this past year, but that he’s now shelling out closer to $200.

“My income has stayed the same,” he said. “The economy is good on paper, but I’m not doing great.”

About 8 in 10 Americans say their overall household debt is higher or about the same as it was a year ago. About half say they currently have credit card debt, 4 in 10 are dealing with auto loans, and about 1 in 4 have medical debt. Just 15% say their household savings have increased over the last year.

Tracy Gonzales, 36, who works as a sub-contractor in construction in San Antonio, Texas, has several thousand dollars of medical debt from an emergency room visit for what she thought was a bad headache but turned out to be a tooth infection.

“They’ll treat you, but the bills are crazy,” she said. Gonzales said she’s tried to avoid seeking medical treatment because of the costs.

Relatively few Americans say they’re very or extremely confident that they could pay an unexpected medical expense (26%) or have enough money for retirement (18%). Only about one-third are extremely or very confident their current financial situation will allow them to keep up with expenses, though an additional 42% say they’re somewhat confident.

“I’ve been looking forward to retirement my entire life. Recently I realized it’s just not going to happen,” said Shapiro, of Pittsburgh, adding that his wife’s $30,000 or so of student debt is a financial factor for his household. The couple had hoped to sell their house and move this past year, but decided instead to hold on to their mortgage rate of 3.4%, rather than facing a higher rate. ( The current average long-term mortgage rate reached 7.79% this month. )

About 3 in 10 Americans say they’ve foregone a major purchase because of higher interest rates in the last year. Nearly 1 in 4 U.S. adults have student debt, with the pandemic-era payment pause on federal loans ending this month, contributing to the crunch.

Will Clouse, 77, of Westlake, Ohio, said inflation is his biggest concern, as he lives on a fixed income in his retirement.

“A box of movie candy — Sno-Caps — that used to cost 99 cents is now a dollar fifty at the grocery store,” he said. “That’s a 50% increase in price. Somebody’s taking advantage of somebody.”

Yet even as Americans have expressed gloomy sentiments about the economy, many have continued spending, which drove a strong quarter of growth from July though September, when the economy expanded at an annual pace of 4.9%.

Even so, wages and salaries have largely trailed inflation since the pandemic, leaving most households worse off, though economists debate which measures are the best to use. In the past 12 months, however, average hourly pay has started to pull ahead of prices, rising 0.5% faster.

Americans are generally split on whether the Republicans (29%) or the Democrats (25%) are better suited to handle the issue of inflation in the U.S. Three in 10 say they trust neither party to address it.

Geri Putnam, 85, of Thomson, Georgia, said she’s been following the ongoing auto workers strikes with sympathy for the workers’ asks.

“I don’t think it’s out of line, what they’re asking for, when you see what CEOs are making,” she said. “I think things have gotten out of control. When you can walk into a store and see the next day, across the board, a dollar increase — that’s a little strange. I understand supply and demand, the cost of shipping, et cetera. But it seems to me everyone’s looking at their bottom lines.”

Putnam also said she sees her six children struggling financially more than her generation did.

“They all have jobs and have never been without them,” she said. “They’re achievers, but I think at least two or three of them will never be able to buy a home.”

A slight majority of all Americans polled (54%) describe their household’s financial situation as good, which is about the same as it’s been for the last year but down from 63% in March of 2022. Older Americans are much more confident in their current finances than younger Americans. Just 39% of 18- to 29-year-olds describe their household finances as good, compared to a majority (58%) of those who are 30 and older. People with higher levels of education or higher household incomes are more likely than Americans overall to evaluate their finances as solid.

About three-quarters of Americans describe the nation’s economy as poor, which is in line with measurements from early last year.

Among those who are retired, 3 in 10 say they are highly confident that there’s enough saved for their retirement, about 4 in 10 are somewhat confident, and 31% are not very confident or not confident at all.

Clouse, of Ohio, said the majority of his money had gone towards caring for his wife for the past several years, as she’d been ill. When she passed away this past year, his household lost her Social Security and pension contributions. He sees the political turmoil between Republicans and Democrats as harming the economy, but remains most frustrated by higher prices at the supermarket.

“Grocery products going up by 20, 30, 40%. There’s no call for that, other than the grocery market people making more money,” he said. “They’re ripping off the consumer. I wish Mr. Biden would do something about that.”

About 4 in 10 Americans (38%) approve of how Biden is handling the presidency, while 61% disapprove. His overall approval numbers have remained at a steady low for the last several years. Most Americans generally disapprove of how he’s handling the federal budget (68% disapprove), the economy (67%), and student debt (58%).

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The poll of 1,163 adults was conducted Oct. 5-9, 2023, using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, designed to represent the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 3.9 percentage points.