I suppose it varies, but it only needs to be true some of the time for CCF to be profitable.
It's more about people in peer groups preoccupied with class distinctions, vs, say, 90% of Americans who could not give less fucks about it.
Region plays a role in the distribution and size of such peer groups though.
Added: Per another comment, people can also be picky not with respect to not eating unusual foods but with respect to not eating mediocre food.
What does it look like when somebody gets “socially in trouble” for being picky? What actually happens to them (socially) in this instance?
I’ve never seen or heard of anything like this, so I’m really curious about it.
It’s not even really pickiness per se. If some group always wants to just eat fast food I’m going to be less inclined to join them. No value judgement. Just not my thing.
And, here's the hook to what you say regarding it being a regional thing: this class distinctions are also applied at the regional level. E.g. whole states can be considered "lower social class" (regardless if they have millionaires or well off upper middle class people and so on).
In "high class" states or circles within a state, though, the stigma would a quite real thing (even if it's just an inconsequental matter, as seen from outside).
It's not about wealth levels either, as class concerns are just as high in stressed-to-appear-appropriately-high-class aspiring classes, that make less than what a developer does, but their circles are all about class distinctions and their shibboleths. The stereotypical "New Yorker" reader would be a total weirdo about such matters, even more stressed and awkward about following all the BS rules than people actually belonging to the 0.1%.
But even if you are a billionaire, you can be the low-class butt of the joke to "old money" types.
(That's my understanding of the US class system on this matter - there are some quite good books about it, "Class" by Paul Fussell is quite good. It's also a subject that certain kinds of literature and journalism wont shut up about).
Indeed.
Living in Hawai'i it would strike me how popular CCF was for people that came all that way (typically middle class Americans) and have access to tons of great variety in ethnic places they may not at home, along with local joints that would serve familiar food with the option of local flavour. But some of these comments put it in good context, that it is the familiar and safe choice and has a special or semi-fancy vibe to a large subset of those people.
I don't think I've eaten in one since I was a preteen and may have only been once, but come to think of it, at the time I grew up rural 45 minutes to the nearest small city, eating at cheesecake factory did seem like a special occasion.
Nobody gives a fuck if you go and eat in a "middling" establishment equivalent to CCF in these here parts, even if you're old money. And nobody cares of most other US shibboleths of class.
Whereas in the US it's as if something like CCF or, god forbid, Olive Garden, has leprosy, for some types of "high class" or wanabee so, people.
When I go to Europe or Asia, I have high confidence I can walk into a random restaurant/cafe and get good food made with high quality fresh ingredients on sight. Of course not every restaurant/cafe is good, but enough are.
Europe. I've tried such american restaurants like CCF, and they're not just "reheated factory produced food". Even Olive Garden isn't that (the prepare stuff on-site, contrary to myth). In fact, they're better than many local ones.
I'd say it's less about liking good food than liking to signal class status. The same people have no issue eating shoddily made chinese take-away or in-and-out or total prepackaged factory crap sold in their upclass super market, because those are not associated with a class stigma.
You see the most obsession with class concerns in areas where you have people who are class mobile: There's a lot of nouveau riche and upper-middle class people in tech, because tech has been a massive boom industry. Likewise you see a fair amount of class concern among people falling down the social ladder, such as the generations that grew up within environment of an old-money fortune, but for whatever reason that money was lost.
I feel like everyone is talking in circles just wanting to be right on the internet.
In Australia at least where there are some chains for casual/fast food but not so much for restaurants, I haven't sensed this stigma because that dining niche is occupied by the local hotel's restaurant or a pub with low to no pretenses but a decent to quite good meal.
I'm not sure it's that, since 99% of the consumption of those same snobs are heavily corporatised consumerism. It's just the expensive kind marketed to more affluent suckers. They're for example OK with Starbucks, the kind of "heavily corporatised consumerism", and all kind of BS upscale consumerist brands like Lululemon.
Related side story: when I lived near SF, I saw in the news that the lone Olive Garden in the city (in Stonestown Galleria) was going to close. I asked out loud "Who on earth eats at the Olive Garden in San Francisco when there are so many other options for authentic Italian?" My wife, who was sitting next to me, got a sheepish look on her face. It turns out she drove into the city all the time specifically to go to that Olive Garden. She said it reminded her of home and she liked the nostalgia of it haha