Local restaurants will get a post-holiday sales boost starting Monday with the return of Washington, D.C. Restaurant Week.
The bi-annual event, created in 2001 to drive local traffic to ailing restaurants post-Sept. 11, can raise revenues from anywhere between 15 and 200 percent in what is typically a slow period for dining out, according to the Washington, D.C., Convention & Tourism Corp.
Restaurant Week will run Jan. 8 to Jan. 14 and more than 170 restaurants in the District, Virginia and Maryland will participate. Each restaurant offers a prix fixe three-course menu for lunch and dinner at significantly reduced rates. Lunch is priced at $20.07 and dinner is prices at $30.07, up from last year’s prices of $20.06 and $30.06.
But despite the reduced prices, the week often ranks as one of the highest in sales for local restaurants.
“Restaurant Week is always our highest sales week of the year, barring private events,” said David Troust, associate general manager of Mie N Yu, during the previous Restaurant Week in August. “It’s the sheer volume and the fact that everyone comes for brunch, lunch and dinner.”
The Georgetown restaurant typically sees about a 15 percent spike in receipts during the week, Troust said, which is a significant boost for a restaurant that is generally booked year-round.
Restaurant Week has also become a way to showcase new restaurants and get people into neighborhoods that they might not normally visit.
For example, PS-7 and Rasika in Washington and Farrah Olivia in Alexandria will make their Restaurant Week debuts.
“We always look forward to this terrific culinary event,” said William Hanbury, president and chief executive officer of the tourism corporation, which is organizing Restaurant Week in cooperation with the Restaurant Association of Metropolitan Washington. “[It] affords residents and visitors a great opportunity to taste what’s happening in the Washington, D.C., restaurant scene and to see what’s happening in the city’s fabulous neighborhoods.”
