How One Restaurant Touches Hundreds of Lives,
Pays Mortgages, Feeds Families, and Powers the Canadian Economy
What I See When I Look at a Restaurant
Most people walk into a restaurant and see a menu, a host stand, and a dining room. They see a place to eat. Maybe a spot to celebrate a birthday, close a deal, or grab something quick on a Tuesday night. And that is all perfectly fine.
But after twenty-two years of working alongside restaurant owners across Canada—watching them build, struggle, adapt, rebuild, and fight for survival I see something profoundly different when I look at a restaurant.
I see an economic engine. A community anchor. A launchpad for first careers and a lifeline for families. I see a generator of ripple effects that touch dozens sometimes hundreds of lives that will never set foot in the dining room. I see mortgages being paid, children being fed, farmers staying in business, tradespeople staying employed, and entire commercial strips staying alive because of the lights on in that one restaurant at the corner.
Recently, I had the privilege of sitting down with Dr. Sylvain Charlebois on our Late Night Restaurant Podcast. Dr. Charlebois known nationally as “The Food Professor” is the Senior Director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University and one of the world’s most cited scholars in food supply chain management. He is not a casual commentator. He is a researcher who deals in data, and the numbers he shared on our podcast were staggering.
But more than the numbers, the conversation reinforced something I have been feeling for years: the general population simply does not see what I see when I look at a restaurant. They do not understand the scale. They do not grasp the ripple effects. They do not realize that when a restaurant closes, the damage radiates outward in every direction, touching people and businesses and families they have never thought about.
This needs to change. And it needs to change now because we are losing restaurants at an alarming rate, and the consequences extend far beyond empty storefronts and “For Lease” signs.
The Numbers That Should Stop Every Canadian in Their Tracks
Before we zoom into the human impact of a single restaurant, let us establish the macro picture because the scale of Canada’s restaurant industry is something most Canadians dramatically underestimate.
$135.2B
Canada’s restaurant industry is estimated at $135.2 billion in 2025. That is larger than the entire GDP of many countries.
1.2M
Nearly 1.2 million Canadians are directly employed in foodservice approximately 6% of the entire national workforce.
100,000+
Over 100,000 restaurant establishments operate across Canada, present in every single province and territory.
$1.80
For every $1 of output in the restaurant industry, $1.80 of output is generated in the broader Canadian economy. This is the multiplier effect.
22%
Nearly one in four Canadians got their very first job in a restaurant the highest percentage of any industry in the country.
4th
Restaurants are the fourth-largest private sector employer in Canada and the number one source of first-time jobs for young workers.
Let those numbers settle in. We are not talking about a small or niche industry. We are talking about a $135 billion economic force that directly employs more than a million Canadians and indirectly supports many hundreds of thousands more through its vast supply chain. Restaurants Canada has stated it plainly: for every dollar of output in the restaurant industry, $1.80 of output is generated in the broader economy. That multiplier is one of the most powerful in any sector.
And yet when we talk about critical infrastructure, when we talk about industries that matter to communities, restaurants are too often left off the list. That is a massive blind spot—and one that is costing us dearly.
What One Single Restaurant Actually Supports
Here is where I need the general public to fundamentally shift their thinking. A restaurant is not just a business that serves food. It is a hub that sustains an entire ecosystem of people, families, businesses, and community structures that most customers never think about.
Let me walk you through what I see when I look at one single restaurant.
The People Inside the Building
A typical full-service restaurant in Canada employs anywhere from 15 to 50 people. More than nine out of ten restaurants have fewer than 50 employees, but even a modest-sized operation with 20 staff represents 20 households. Twenty sets of bills. Twenty lives directly tied to whether that restaurant survives or closes.
And here is the critical detail that most people miss: each of those employees is not just earning spending money. They are using that paycheque as the foundation their entire life is built on.
Mortgages and rent. A line cook making $18–22 an hour is paying rent on an apartment, possibly supporting a partner or children. A front-of-house manager is making mortgage payments on their first home. A server working full-time is covering rent in a city where the average one-bedroom apartment exceeds $1,500 a month in most major markets. A dishwasher often a newcomer to Canada may be sending a portion of their earnings home to family while paying rent here. When that restaurant closes its doors, every single one of those housing payments is suddenly at risk. And in a housing market as tight as Canada’s, “just find another job” is not the simple answer people imagine it to be.
Groceries and household essentials. These employees are not just feeding themselves. They are feeding their families. They are buying school supplies for their children, filling prescriptions, keeping the electricity on, paying phone bills, purchasing winter coats. The restaurant paycheque is the bedrock that everything else in the household rests upon. When that foundation disappears, it is not just one person who suffers it is everyone who depends on them.
Childcare and education. Daycare costs in Canada average $8,000 to $15,000 per year depending on the province, and that number is significantly higher in major cities. Many restaurant employees are parents who rely on their income to keep their children in childcare so they can continue to work. It is a cycle: without the job, they cannot afford childcare; without childcare, they cannot look for a new job. Beyond childcare, one in five young Canadians between 15 and 24 years old works in foodservice many of them university and college students funding their education. Nearly half of the entire restaurant workforce is under 25. These are young people paying for tuition, textbooks, rent, and food while building the skills they will carry into every future career they ever have.
Transportation. Car payments, auto insurance, gas, transit passes, bike repairs. The restaurant paycheque keeps people mobile. It keeps them able to get to work, get their kids to school, run their lives. When we talk about the economic impact of a restaurant, we need to remember that every dollar spent on transportation by a restaurant employee is another dollar circulating in the local economy.
Debt and financial obligations. Student loans, credit card payments, personal lines of credit, CERB repayment plans. Many Canadians including restaurant workers are carrying significant personal debt. A steady paycheque is the only thing standing between manageable debt and financial crisis.
Mental health and personal wellbeing. Employment is one of the strongest social determinants of mental health. It provides not just income, but structure, purpose, social connection, and identity. When restaurants close—and Canada lost a net 7,000 restaurants in 2025 with another 4,000 projected to close in 2026 according to Dr. Charlebois and the Agri-Food Analytics Lab the human cost goes far beyond economics. It is anxiety. It is depression. It is relationship stress. It is parents worrying about how they will feed their children. And it is compounded by the fact that restaurant workers often have less access to benefits, savings, and employment insurance buffers than workers in other industries.
The People Outside the Building
This is the part that is truly invisible to the general public. For every person employed inside the restaurant, there is an entire network of people and businesses whose livelihoods depend on that restaurant’s survival. This is the hidden economy of the restaurant industry and it is enormous.
Farmers and food producers. Every restaurant has relationships with food suppliers who source from Canadian farms. A mid-sized restaurant might order 200 pounds of beef a week, 50 cases of produce, dozens of kilograms of dairy, fish, poultry, grains, and specialty ingredients. That money flows directly to ranchers in Alberta, vegetable growers in the Okanagan, greenhouse operators in Leamington, dairy farmers in Quebec, seafood harvesters on both coasts. Restaurants are one of the most significant buyers of Canadian agricultural products. When restaurants close, farmers lose customers and in agriculture, losing a reliable weekly buyer can be the difference between survival and bankruptcy. Dr. Charlebois has spoken extensively about how the loss of independent restaurants can slow food innovation, which has historically influenced both dining culture and grocery retail. The farmer who supplies the restaurant that showcases their specialty product is part of an ecosystem that makes Canadian food culture vibrant and diverse.
Equipment suppliers and skilled trades. A single restaurant contains tens of thousands of dollars in commercial equipment: ovens, ranges, fryers, refrigeration units, walk-in coolers, dishwashers, exhaust hoods, HVAC systems, grease traps, fire suppression systems, plumbing, electrical panels. All of this equipment needs to be purchased, installed, maintained, and repaired. A thriving restaurant ecosystem supports an entire network of tradespeople electricians, plumbers, refrigeration mechanics, HVAC technicians, fire safety inspectors, equipment sales professionals. These are skilled workers with families, mortgages, and truck payments of their own.
Linen companies, cleaning services, and waste management. Uniforms, chef coats, tablecloths, napkins, bar towels commercial linen services have entire divisions dedicated to restaurant clients. Deep cleaning companies schedule regular visits. Grease trap pumping services, pest control companies, and commercial waste haulers all depend on restaurant contracts. These are not glamorous businesses, but they employ real people with real families and when restaurant closures shrink their client base, those jobs are directly at risk.
Technology companies and POS providers. Point-of-sale systems, online ordering platforms, reservation software, inventory management tools, payroll processing, loyalty programs, digital menu boards. The restaurant technology industry in Canada has exploded in the last decade, and it employs software developers, sales teams, customer support staff, implementation specialists, and hardware technicians. Every restaurant closure is a cancelled subscription, a returned terminal, and a lost account.
Accountants, lawyers, insurance brokers, and consultants. Every restaurant needs professional services. Payroll companies process their payments. Accountants file their taxes and help manage cash flow. Insurance brokers arrange their liability, property, and workers’ compensation coverage. Marketing agencies build their brands. Architects and designers create their spaces. Lawyers review their leases. I have personally spent twenty-two years as part of this ecosystem and I can tell you with absolute certainty that when restaurants struggle, every professional who serves them feels it. Our businesses are downstream of their success.
Landlords and commercial real estate. Restaurants are anchor tenants in strip malls, downtown cores, neighbourhood main streets, and mixed-use developments across Canada. They generate foot traffic that benefits every adjacent business. When a restaurant closes, the landlord loses rent but the damage does not stop there. Empty storefronts drag down property values. Foot traffic drops, and the neighbouring businesses the hair salon, the dry cleaner, the pharmacy, the boutique all suffer reduced customer volume. As Dr. Charlebois has noted, restaurants are “the ultimate lure for the retail business, enticing people to go out.” Remove the restaurant, and you remove the reason people came to that street in the first place.
The arts, entertainment, and event community. Restaurants host live music nights, trivia events, community fundraisers, art shows, wine tastings, and private celebrations. They commission local artists for interior design. They partner with event planners for weddings and corporate gatherings. They are the social gathering spaces that hold communities together especially in smaller towns where the local restaurant may be the only dedicated venue for bringing people together.
Why $1 in a Restaurant Becomes $1.80 Across Canada
Restaurants Canada has documented one of the most important economic statistics in our country: for every dollar of output in the restaurant industry, $1.80 of output is generated across the broader economy. This is the multiplier effect in action, and it is one of the most powerful economic forces in our communities.
Let me make this tangible. When you spend $100 at a local restaurant, here is a simplified picture of where that money goes:
Roughly $30–35 goes to food cost which flows to the supplier, the distributor, the farmer, and everyone in between.
Roughly $25–30 goes to labour paycheques that employees spend on rent, groceries, childcare, transportation, and every other household expense.
Roughly $8–15 goes to occupancy costs rent to the landlord, who uses it to pay the mortgage, property taxes, and maintenance contractors.
A portion goes to utilities, insurance, technology, professional services, and supplies each of which employs people and generates its own downstream economic activity.
And a portion goes to government in the form of taxes income tax, payroll taxes, property taxes, HST which funds healthcare, education, and infrastructure.
Now each of those recipients spends their share, and their recipients spend theirs. The server buys groceries. The grocery store pays its employees. Those employees fill up their cars with gas. The gas station pays its staff. On and on it goes. That is the multiplier. That $100 dinner generates $180 of total economic activity.
Now multiply that across $135 billion in annual industry revenue. The total economic output generated by Canada’s restaurant industry is not $135 billion it is closer to $243 billion when you account for the multiplier effect. That is a quarter of a trillion dollars circulating through our economy, touching virtually every sector, in every community, in every province.
“For every dollar of output in the restaurant industry, $1.80 of output is generated in the broader economy.” Restaurants Canada, 2024 Foodservice Facts
The Gateway to the Canadian Workforce
There is a dimension to the restaurant industry’s impact that is deeply personal for millions of Canadians, and it does not show up in GDP calculations or economic multiplier studies. The restaurant industry is not just an employer. It is the single most important launching pad for Canadian workers entering the labour force.
Twenty-two percent of all Canadians got their first job in a restaurant the highest percentage of any industry in the country. Nearly eight in ten Canadians agree that working in restaurants teaches you how to be a team player. More than seven in ten agree that the restaurant industry helps young Canadians develop crucial skills. And the data backs it up: 48% of all restaurant workers are between 15 and 24 years old, making the industry the number one employer of young Canadians by a wide margin.
Think about what a first restaurant job teaches a young person. Time management. Teamwork under pressure. Customer service. Conflict resolution. Working in a fast-paced environment with multiple priorities competing for your attention. Communicating with diverse teams. Taking responsibility for outcomes. These are not just restaurant skills these are life skills that carry over into every career that follows.
But the restaurant industry is not just a youth employer. It plays a critical role in immigrant integration as well. The restaurant sector is the largest employer of immigrants and newcomers in Canada. Nearly 59% of permanent restaurant employees are women, and more than 30% are immigrants. Among temporary workers in the sector, roughly half were not born in Canada. By 2023, non-permanent residents accounted for more than 20% of the entire food services workforce, with that figure reaching 25% in limited-service eating places.
For many newcomers, a restaurant job is the first rung on the ladder the entry point into the Canadian economy, the place where they build local work experience, improve their language skills, start networking, and begin the process of building a life in a new country. When we lose restaurants, we are not just losing places to eat. We are losing the on-ramp that millions of Canadians young people, newcomers, students, career changers, seniors supplementing their retirement use to enter or re-enter the workforce.
What We Lose When a Restaurant Closes
Economists can measure the financial impact of restaurant closures. What is harder to quantify but equally devastating is the social impact.
Restaurants are where communities gather. They are the place where families celebrate milestones, where friends reconnect, where colleagues bond, where first dates happen, where business deals are shaken on, where neighbours run into each other on a Saturday morning. Restaurants Canada’s own research shows that restaurants are the number one attraction in Canada for spending time with family and friends. Forty-five percent of Canadians dine out at least once a week not because they are hungry, but because restaurants serve a social function that nothing else replicates.
In smaller communities, the impact is even more pronounced. The local restaurant may be the only dedicated gathering space in town. It is where the hockey team goes after a game, where the Rotary Club meets, where the town’s unofficial business networking happens. Close that restaurant, and you do not just lose a place to eat you lose the social heart of the community.
And there is a cultural impact that Dr. Charlebois has spoken about eloquently. Independent restaurants the ones most vulnerable to closure are the ones that bring culinary innovation to Canadian communities. They introduce us to new cuisines, new flavours, new cultural traditions. As Dr. Charlebois has said, “Over the last several decades, Canadians have had access to new cuisine, new flavours, new tastes without a passport due to these innovative restaurant operators, and a lot of them are independents.” When independents close and only chain operations survive, our food culture becomes homogenized, and something irreplaceable is lost.
The Crisis We Cannot Afford to Ignore
The numbers from Dr. Charlebois and the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University are sobering, and they demand our attention. 7,000
Net restaurant establishments lost in Canada in 2025, according to Dalhousie University’s Agri-Food Analytics Lab. 4,000
Additional restaurants projected to close on a net basis in 2026. 62%
Of Canadian restaurants are operating at a loss or barely breaking even up from just 10% before the pandemic. 80%
Of Canadian restaurants carry some level of debt. 30%
Increase in restaurant bankruptcies in 2024 the highest annual figure in a decade. 56%
Of Canadians say they have reduced spending on dining out this year.
The challenges are compounding from every direction simultaneously. Food costs are rising. Insurance premiums are climbing. Labour remains tight in many parts of the country, even as immigration policy shifts reduce the availability of temporary workers who have historically filled critical roles in kitchens across the nation. Rent continues to increase. Utilities are more expensive. And consumers are pulling back, choosing to eat at home, skip the appetizers, skip the bottle of wine, skip the dessert all of the high margin items that restaurants depend on to survive on razor thin food margins.
Canadians are also drinking less alcohol a trend driven by higher prices, health consciousness, and shifting social norms. This may sound like a minor detail, but it is anything but. Alcohol has traditionally been one of the few high-margin categories available to restaurant operators. It has historically subsidized food margins. As Dr. Charlebois has explained, as alcohol volumes decline, operators lose one of the few high margin categories capable of offsetting rising kitchen and labour costs. Replacing those margins through food alone is economically very difficult.
Meanwhile, the growth of delivery and takeout since the pandemic has further complicated the picture. Off-premise dining reduces opportunities for high margin beverage sales and in-restaurant add-ons, putting additional strain on operators particularly independent restaurants that lack the purchasing power, marketing budgets, and franchisor support that large chain systems enjoy.
Let me be blunt about what this means in human terms. Behind every one of those 7,000 closures in 2025, and every one of the 4,000 projected for 2026, there is a story that looks something like this:
An owner who mortgaged their home or drained their retirement savings to fund the dream of opening a restaurant. A team of 15 to 40 employees suddenly without income, scrambling for jobs in an already difficult labour market. A food supplier who just lost a weekly order worth thousands of dollars. A delivery driver whose route just got thinner. A landlord staring at an empty unit in a commercial strip that is now visibly struggling. A neighbourhood that just lost its gathering place, its anchor, its reason for foot traffic.
It is more complicated than just serving food. It always has been. And the people inside this industry have known that for years. The question is whether the people outside it are finally ready to listen.
Mapping the Lives Touched by One Restaurant: A Conservative Estimate
Let me attempt something that I do not think has been done often enough: a rough but honest accounting of how many lives a single mid-sized Canadian restaurant touches.
Consider a full-service restaurant doing $1.5 million in annual revenue with 25 employees. Here is a conservative mapping of the lives connected to that one operation:
25 direct employees and their household members. If the average Canadian household size is 2.4 people, that is 60 individuals whose daily lives depend on those paycheques.
3–5 food suppliers and distributors, each of which employs their own teams of drivers, warehouse workers, and sales reps. Conservatively, another 15–25 people are directly involved in getting food to that restaurant.
5–10 service providers: the linen company, the cleaning service, the waste hauler, the pest control company, the equipment maintenance firm. Each sends a person or team regularly, employing another 10–20 people who count that restaurant as part of their route or client list.
2–4 professional service providers: accountant, bookkeeper, insurance broker, legal advisor, marketing consultant, technology support. Another 5–10 people whose professional practice includes that restaurant as a client.
1 landlord or property management company, plus maintenance staff, property tax contributions to the municipality, and the cascading effect on neighbouring tenants’ foot traffic.
Upstream agricultural producers: the farmers, ranchers, fishers, and producers whose products end up on the menu. Depending on sourcing, this could connect to dozens of agricultural workers across multiple provinces.
Add it all together, and a single mid-sized restaurant directly and indirectly touches somewhere between 100 and 200 people. And we have not even counted the customers the thousands of community members who visit each year and whose social lives, celebrations, and daily routines are shaped by that restaurant’s existence.
Now multiply that by 100,000 restaurants across Canada, and you begin to understand the true scale of what this industry means to this country.
What We Need: A Call to Action
After twenty-two years of helping restaurants, I can tell you that the operators in this industry are among the most resilient, hardworking, creative, and passionate business people in this country. They work 70-hour weeks. They personally guarantee loans. They take pay cuts so their team gets paid first. They adapt to every new challenge pandemic closures, supply chain disruptions, labour shortages, inflation, shifting consumer behaviour with a level of grit that would humble most corporate executives.
But resilience has a limit. And we are testing that limit right now.
What the public can do
Understand what you are actually supporting when you choose to dine out or order from a local restaurant. You are not just buying a meal. You are paying someone’s rent. You are keeping a farmer in business. You are funding a young person’s education. You are supporting the mental health and stability of dozens of employees. You are generating $1.80 in economic activity for every dollar you spend. You are keeping a community alive. Choose local. Choose independent. Choose to eat out when you can and understand the real impact of that choice.
What government can do
Recognize that restaurants are critical infrastructure not a luxury industry, not a “nice to have,” but an essential pillar of community prosperity. Permanent GST/HST relief on all food regardless of where it is consumed something Dr. Charlebois has advocated for publicly. Meaningful support for independent operators. Policies that recognize the $1.80 multiplier effect and the fact that restaurant investment is one of the most efficient forms of community economic development. Immigration policies that acknowledge the sector’s critical dependence on newcomer workers, particularly in regions outside major urban centres where labour shortages are most acute.
What industry partners can do
Landlords, lenders, suppliers, and service providers: work alongside restaurants, not just profit from them. Understand that a restaurant’s survival benefits everyone in the ecosystem. Flexible lease arrangements during downturns protect your long-term revenue stream. Lending partners who understand the restaurant business intimately—who see, know, and live the industry are far more valuable than those who take a narrow view and inflate risk assessments when times get tough.
What all of us can do
Tell this story. Share these numbers. Help the people in your life understand that a restaurant is not just a place to eat it is the economic and social backbone of Canadian communities. The more people who understand this, the more support and momentum we build for an industry that has given so much to this country and asks for so little in return.
What I See: A Final Reflection
When I walk into a restaurant today any restaurant, in any city or town across this country I do not just see a dining room.
I see the server who is making her mortgage payment this month because of that shift. I see the line cook whose children are in daycare because he has a steady paycheque and his wife can work her own job knowing the kids are cared for. I see the farmer three provinces away whose livelihood is connected to the order that was just placed this morning. I see the delivery driver who will bring tomorrow’s produce at 5 a.m., the equipment repair technician who will fix the walk-in cooler next Tuesday, the accountant who will reconcile the books at month-end, the insurance broker who will renew the policy in March, the linen company employee who will drop off fresh tablecloths on Thursday.
I see 100 to 200 lives connected to this one building. This one business. This one restaurant.
I see an economic engine that generates $1.80 for every dollar it earns. I see a launching pad where 22% of Canadians took their first step into the workforce. I see a $135 billion industry that employs 1.2 million of our neighbours, friends, and family members. I see an industry that has given this country its food culture, its gathering places, its celebrations, its community identity.
That is what I see after twenty-two years. That is what Dr. Charlebois’s data confirms. That is what the numbers prove again and again.
And that is what I will keep fighting for because if we do not fight for this industry, the consequences will be felt in every household, every community, and every corner of this country.
It is time the rest of Canada saw what I see.
Canada’s Restaurant Guy
Sources and References
Restaurants Canada – 2024 Foodservice Facts Report & Charting a Path to Prosperity (September 2024)
Restaurants Canada – 2025/26 Sales Forecast Revision (November 2025)
Dr. Sylvain Charlebois, Agri-Food Analytics Lab, Dalhousie University – Restaurant Closure Projections (January 2026)
Statistics Canada – Workforce Insights: Demographics in the Food Services and Drinking Places Subsector, 2017–2023
Statistics Canada – Food Services and Drinking Places Monthly Data (2024–2025)
Statistics Canada – Stats are on the Menu! Canada’s Restaurant Industry Infographic
UFCW Canada – By the Numbers: Canada’s Food Service Industry
Tourism HR Canada – Spotlight: Food and Beverage Services Workforce
Toast Canada – 60 Restaurant Industry Statistics and Trends for Canada (2024)
Government of Canada, Canadian Occupational Projection System – Food Services Industrial Summary
Doane Grant Thornton – Canada’s Restaurants Face Shifting Consumer Trends (2025)
Sustain Ontario – The Multiplier Effect of Buying Local Food
Late Night Restaurant Podcast – Interview with Dr. Sylvain Charlebois
