After two very tough years, Alberta’s restaurants and bars are doing much better in terms of the revenue they are taking in.

We now have data for the first half of the year and it shows that sales were up by 36% ($1.3 billion) compared to the same period in 2021 and by 42% ($1.5 billion) compared to the first half of 2020.

Less encouraging, year-to-date sales are—despite inflation—only 4% ($211 million) above where they were in 2019.

Nationally, year-to-date sales were up in every province compared to the same point in 2021 for an average increase of 40%.

With revenue up by only 3% and similar to the situation in Alberta, national restaurant and bar sales over the first half of 2022 are not as impressive when compared to the same period in 2019. In Ontario, year-to-date sales in 2022 were still 0.1% lower than in 2019.

The restaurant and bar sector in Alberta and the other provinces is doing better than it was during the first two years of the pandemic, but higher operating costs, labour shortages, and any bills that piled up during the pandemic continue to present significant challenges. These challenges will be easier to address if sales continue to build over the second half of the year.

Answer to the previous trivia question: Joey Chestnut ate 63 hot dogs in 10 minutes to win the 2022 Nathan's Famous International Hot Dog Eating Contest

Today’s trivia question: Which European capital was liberated on August 25, 1944?