Jim Nuetzi has a lot on his plate: reinventing a stale pasta menu that can boost sales and help get activist investors off his bosses’ back.
Nuetzi is head chef at Olive Garden, Darden Restaurants Inc. (DRI:US)’s biggest brand. As part of an effort to bring foodie sensibility to a chain that tends to attract an older crowd, he’s experimenting with capers, kale and pistachio-crusted truffles — ingredients more often found at hipper joints.
Darden, a casual-dining company that also owns LongHorn Steakhouse and Bahama Breeze, badly needs to revive Olive Garden to turn around slumping sales and fend off activist investors Starboard Value LP and Barington Capital Group LP. Darden’s shareholder critics disagree with a plan by Chief Executive Officer Clarence Otis to spin off the company’s ailing Red Lobster chain and are calling for new management.
“Everything else will work itself out if they can get Olive Garden trending in the right direction,” said Peter Saleh, an analyst at Telsey Advisory Group in New York.