In Here, It's Always Friday. On March 15, 1965 casual dining got a serious kick start. That’s when a fun-loving New Yorker named Alan Stillman purchased a bar located on 1st Avenue and 63rd Street and named it T.G.I. Friday’s … Thank God It’s Friday’s. Okay, so his main goal was to meet stewardesses, but what he didn’t know at the time was that he was going to create what is now referred to as the casual dining industry.

From that moment on, lunch, dinner and drinks took on a whole new meaning. His restaurant quickly turned into the place to be for a helluva good time on any day, but especially on Friday’s.

The first T.G.I. Friday’s restaurant was an overnight sensation. What began as the ultimate “singles’ bar became a destination synonymous with FUN for couples, co-workers and buddies. Friday’s® was different and it became THE place to see and be seen.

Stillman’s ideas fashioned the legacy that exists in all Friday’s restaurants to this day. The décor, music, lights and staff continue to provide a lively, eclectic and engaging atmosphere. (Just the thing to scare off wallflowers and still-lifes.) It’s the perfect place for celebrating virtually anything among super-social butterflies.

So come in, catch the big game over beers, mingle, gossip with the girls, connect with friends or make new ones. All while enjoying fantastic food you can’t find anywhere else, like our signature Jack Daniel’s Grill®.

Today, T.G.I. Friday’s offers a casual dining experience unlike any other, where you can expect great food, drinks and plenty of fun to go around at over 900 locations in 47 states and more than 60 countries. Just don’t expect a dull moment at any of them.

Friday’s Fun Facts
- T.G.I. Friday’s restaurant is synonymous with ‘flair bartending’ and as a matter of fact, we’re credited with inventing it. To celebrate this phenomenon, we created the first World Bartender Championships in the mid 80’s to honor the famous trend-setting, bottle-tossing style of bartenders around the globe. The tradition continues today!
- There was once a tradition of welcoming Friday at the stroke of midnight on Thursdays with, what else, a party! Half-price drinks, free champagne, hats, noisemakers, confetti and tambourines were given out to party-goers. And today we find any reason to party!
- It can take up to 1½ years to collect all the memorabilia, a.k.a. flair, for one restaurant. We have really cool archeologists.
- There is enough memorabilia stored at one time to open 10 restaurants. It’s a big, big warehouse!
- It takes 4-5 days to arrange pieces of flair and each restaurant places them uniquely. Just when you think there’s only one way to hang a racing scull…
- In older restaurants there is usually a picture of a boat or man, ‘Father Friday’s,’ on the wall underneath the brass copula in the men’s room. Or a sign that reads … “Beware of Trains.” Don’t ask.
- The stripes all face toward the door to create uniformity and maximum stripey-ness.