Another national restaurant chain has bitten the red dirt dust!
Earlier this week, someone informed the masses on OKC Reddit that the TGI Fridays on NW Expressway – the last remaining location in the state – closed last month on December 17th.

Yep, that’s right. Pop a potato skin, chug a bottle of Jack Daniel’s sauce, and try to figure out how you can work somewhere for 7 years a few years ago. Just like the old Red Lobster next door, TGI Fridays is history… and it took a month before anyone around town noticed!
Seriously, if that doesn’t sum up the struggles of the chain, I’m not sure what else does.
Usually, when a long-time or well-known restaurant closes, it gets a heavy dose of media attention. In fact, the restaurant doesn’t have to be open that long, or even that well-known, to spark coverage when it shuts down.



To be clear, I’m not knocking The Drake. I liked to swing in there two or three times a year and snag some happy hour oysters at the bar, and I plan on going one last time before they close for good. It’s just interesting that a newer, local seafood spot that never quite gained traction gets plenty of media coverage, while the closure of a massive chain everyone’s visited at least once doesn’t even make a ripple.
But back to Fridays.
The restaurant’s closure leaves me tripping on a nostalgia hole in my paper heart.
I’ve spent most of my adult life in the Northwest metro, and for a moment in the late 1990s and early 2000s, when dining chains ruled the world and Henry Hudson’s was the closest thing Oklahoma City had to a local bar and restaurant scene, Fridays was a quick and convenient spot to snag some happy hour beers and cheap apps.
Whether we were pre-gaming before a trip to The Boar's Head, meeting for late-night drinks following a shift at another restaurant, or simply hanging out with friends, it was always a decent place to gather.
Or at least better than Chili’s or Bennigan’s.
As the years went on, new chains arrived on the scene, and the locally-owned restaurant renaissance began to blossom, my visits to Fridays – like everyone else's – became less and less frequent, to the point that I probably haven’t been there in 20 years.
In fact, it kind of makes me wonder how the place hung on as long as it did.
Anyway, with the restaurant now gone, it will be interesting to see what happens to the vacant TGIF/Red Lobster mega-plex on NW Expressway.
The area has a large footprint and is located on a busy thoroughfare that tens of thousands of cars drive down each day, but for whatever reason, businesses on that stretch of NW Expressway always seem to struggle. Will some new chain – Pappadeaux, are you listening? – come in and stake a claim, or will it be redeveloped into something more suitable?
I guess we’ll wait around and see. Right now, the only clear thing is Oklahoma City’s dining scene has evolved, and TGI Fridays is officially in the past.
Stay with The Lost Ogle. We’ll keep you advised.