Restaurants May Be Flashing an Early Warning

When customers start to feel uncertain, one of the first things they give up is eating out. Last year, Smoke Shop’s aluminum-tray metric was up 3 percent; this year it’s down 1 percent.

Good Morning!

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THE ECONOMY

Restaurants are rolling out deals, trying not to raise prices, and getting nervous: “At the barbecue joint Smoke Shop [in Boston], the customer who used to come three times a month now stops by twice. At Brine, summer has been remarkably slow for a seafood restaurant with a patio in Newburyport. And at Shanti, an Indian restaurant in Dorchester and Roslindale, corporate clients are trimming their catering budgets. Restaurant owners aren’t ready to utter the ‘r’ word yet — the dreaded recession economists keep predicting — but something’s different.”