As most of you know, New York City recently passed a new “calorie labeling law” which requires restaurant chains with more than a certain number of restaurants across the country to include calorie information on menus. 

WHY?  It must be that the food at Houston’s restaurants is so high in calories that the company believes publishing the information will lead to fewer sales.  If that’s the case, then I certainly don’t want to eat there!

What do the Houston’s Restaurant people say?  “We feel rather strongly that the [legislation] does not apply to us,” says Glenn Viers, a vice president of Hillstone Restaurant Group of Los Angeles, which owns Houston’s.

Um, what?  How could the legislation not apply?  Any restaurant with more than 15 locations must post their calorie information.  There are clearly more than 15 Houston’s restaurants in the country.  In fact, I probably have eaten at most of them!

The city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene agrees that Houston’s must follow this important law.  They have already fined the two NYC Houston’s restaurants for noncompliance.  Unfortunately, the fine did nothing.  I guess Houston’s makes such a large profit that they can afford to pay the fines!  Houston’s is set to speak before a judge on September 1.

Houston’s is one of the few restaurant chains that refuses to cooperate.  “For the most part, there is widespread compliance,” says Elliott Marcus, an associate commissioner of the city Department of Health.  Since the law went into effect, only 336 chains were fined (out of a possible 2,691).  Most of the fines involved technical issues (the calorie listings were printed too small or weren’t close enough to the actual food items on the menu).  Most of these were also issued in the few months after the law went into effect, before the chains fully understood the law.

Houston’s is deliberately going out of its way to try to circumvent the law! The law applies to “restaurants with 15 or more outlets operating under the same name with standardized menus.”

In a ridiculous move, the company changed the name that appears on the NYC Houston’s menus to “Hillstone”., the name of the restaurant’s parent company.  Yet the sign outside still says “Houston’s”.  Is that supposed to trick us into thinking it’s not Houston’s?  Doesn’t having a “parent company” imply being part of a chain?  Are they trying to pretend the restaurants are unrelated?  Also, they “slightly” changed some of the offerings at the two NYC restaurants.  All the other Houston’s throughout the country have identical menus.

According to CrainsNewYork.com, “Some differences are straightforward. The Park Avenue South location offers sushi rolls, while the Citicorp Center eatery does not. Other variations are simply in the description. Both restaurants offer a $14 grilled artichoke appetizer, but one lists the dish as California Artichokes and the other describes it as Jumbo Artichokes.”

The question remains, why is Houston’s fighting so hard to circumvent this law?  Why are they willing to spend all this money to pay fines and pay attorney’s fees to go to court?  What are they trying to hide?  In my opinion, it is a terrible PR move.  It makes me think that the food at Houston’s is so fattening that they are embarrassed about it.  Why else would they put in such a big effort to avoid disclosing the calorie count?

Well, I don’t know if Houston’s will succeed in avoiding this law.  But they did succeed in making me never want to eat in another Houston’s restaurant ever again.