There’s a wealth of local talent. Homegrown chefs are opening restaurants and eyeing expansion.
Local pizzerias, ice cream shops, cocktail lounges and more are regularly recognized nationally and internationally as top places to visit. Phoenix chefs get featured in Netflix shows and by major publications. Our outstanding cooks have claimed James Beard Award medals in the Best Chef - Southwest category for two years running.
And, although greeted locally with a healthy amount of skepticism, out-of-state restaurant groups that range from casual to fine dining have set their sights on all corners of the Valley. That willingness of outsiders to invest in new locations here is just another signal that Phoenix’s culinary scene has arrived.
But no matter how healthy our food scene appears, the summers increasingly hit it like a brush fire. Everyone feels the heat. And as the weeks slog on, the businesses that can't adapt are reduced to a memory.
Each year, it seems, the unrelenting heat stretches on longer. Phoenix averaged 111 days over 100 degrees from 1991 to 2020, per the National Weather Service. This decade has seen three of the city’s hottest summers on record, mauling us with record-breaking stretches of triple-digit temperatures. In 2023, we endured 133 straight 100-plus-degree days. Then 2024 cracked its knuckles and gave us 143 in a row.
Couple that with rising costs and an unease about the economy, and diners start to rethink their evening out. Those same costs wallop restaurants.
Rent prices have gone up 10 to 15% since the pandemic, says Arizona Restaurant Association President and CEO Steve Chucri.
Even though chefs buy ingredients wholesale, food prices are 36% higher than they were pre-pandemic, according to the National Restaurant Association. Labor costs have also escalated. Minimum wage today is $14.70, up from $10 eight years ago.
Restaurants have little financial room for error. Average profit margins are a slender 3 to 5%, making any macro changes perilous.
Together, those factors can be fatal. Last summer, the Valley saw all of those issues converge.
According to past Phoenix New Times coverage, 63 restaurants closed between May and September 2024, compared to 41 in the same period in 2023. That was a 54% surge in restaurant collapses.
“2024 was the worst summer on record for restaurants,” says Kimber Lanning, CEO of Local First Arizona. “And 2025 is shaping up to be just as bad, if not slightly worse.”
How restaurants try to take the heat
The heat is its own challenge, albeit one that residents and restaurants try to anticipate.“Summers are always slower,” says Bernie Kantak, a long-time chef and the restaurateur behind Citizen Public House, The Gladly and Beginner’s Luck. “You save a little more money in the bank and kind of hope for the best.”
That slowdown happens for a number of reasons. Snowbirds pack up and leave by May. Students go on summer break. People with the means to escape the triple-digit heat will do so, often for weeks on end. Now, the heat just seems to drag on longer.
“Summer used to be three months,” says Lanning, whose organization champions local businesses. “Now summer is really six months.”
To survive those leaner times, some restaurants and bars reduce the size of their staff. Others limit their hours or close for a few weeks. Chefs create specials and host events or team up with industry friends to encourage diners to come out.
But while restaurant owners work to entice customers, they know everyone is feeling the pinch of higher costs.
Phoenix has suffered some of the highest inflation rates in the country. The cost of a dinner out for four increased by nearly 26% between October 2020 and May 2024, per the nonpartisan think tank the Common Sense Institute. One way people may have adjusted? Dining out less often.
Chef Patience "Patty" Ogunbanjo, of food truck Lasgidi Cafe, says last year was tough overall because of the economy. She’s seen the price of bell peppers and tomatoes — ingredients that go into about 80% of her menu — double since she opened in 2023.
“The cost of everything has really inflated,” she says, “and people are not circling the dollars back like they used to.”
So far this summer season, 25 restaurants have closed in May and June, based on New Times’ tracking. That’s just three fewer than the same period last year.
But new restaurant openings have been stronger. More than 200 restaurants opened over the past winter and spring compared to 180 in 2024, according to openings tracked by Phoenix magazine. Restaurant vacancies through the first quarter of this year were just 4.4%, according to a report from Western Retail Advisors.
Chucri says the year, so far, has been a "mixed bag." A handful of his members share that they've had a busier-than-average summer. The vast majority, though, are flat or down so far this season, he notes.
Some local businesses, such as sourdough bakery Proof Bread, have focused on growth as a way to survive. It's the age-old business adage, co-owner Jon Przybyl says: "If you're not growing, you're dying." The baker is adding physical locations and exploring restaurant partnerships, including a July collaboration with Arizona Wilderness Brewing Co.
The craft brewer, which is owned by Jonathan Buford and Patrick Ware, has likewise expanded, opening a new brewpub on McDowell Road in April. The new Phoenix location, whose seating is entirely indoors, is in some ways a counterpoint to its popular downtown outpost, which is centered around an outdoor patio. The building also doubles as brewing space, allowing Arizona Wilderness to grow its capacity while brewing more efficiently and reducing its carbon footprint.
While the ever-optimistic Buford would like to believe there are "greener pastures ahead," he knows that, realistically, restaurants have to be more adaptable than ever to survive in the desert.
“Yeah, it’s hot in the summertime, but I don’t know that there’s any downhill ahead,” he says. “It’s all uphill. And you better get in shape for it.”
