Community
BY ELLE BENT
Michelin Guide will soon feature Texas restaurants, hotels
Texas’s Food Industry
The Michelin Guide will soon become available in Texas, and will highlight local restaurants and award them with Michelin Stars. The gist In a partnership between the Michelin Guide and Travel Texas, part of the Governor’s Economic Development and Tourism Office, the first guide will be published later this year, featuring restau- rants in Austin, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio. “The introduction of the [Michelin] Guide will be a tremendous asset for Texas, promoting our rich and diverse food culture, and elevating the restaurant scene to an international stage,” Travel Texas Director Tim Fennell said in a news release. This year’s Texas restaurant selections will later join the guide’s hotel selections, featuring places to stay in Texas and around the world. “Consumers want options, especially when they decide where to travel,” CEO of the Texas
Restaurant Association Emily Williams Knight said. “The Michelin Guide will increase foot traffic to all kinds of local establishments because while visitors enjoy one or more meals at an experiential restaurant, they’ll also enjoy delicious food from the nearby taco truck, legendary barbecue joint and neighborhood cafe during their stay.” Some context Michelin Stars—given to restaurants based upon their cooking—are awarded by anonymous “inspectors,” who are already in Texas making dining reservations as any other customer. Restau- rant selections for the guide are determined by the inspectors who remain unknown to restaurant owners for partiality. The Michelin Guide was first published in France, and the first North American guide was published in 2005 for New York. The guide began as a way to help French motorists plan trips while boosting car and tire sales.
The Michelin Guide is anticipated to attract visitors to local restaurants across the state’s major cities, where the food service industry is the state’s largest private sector employer. 91% of restaurants in Texas are small businesses, with fewer than 50 employees 1.4M Texans are employed by the food service industry $106B in sales are made annually in Texas’s food service industry $2.35 goes back toward Texas’s economy for every $1 spent at a Texas restaurant
SOURCE: TEXAS RESTAURANT ASSOCIATION/COMMUNITY IMPACT
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