WASHINGTON -- The National Restaurant Association here has reported that soup's popularity is heating up all over.
are springing up here and in other large metropolitan areas, the NRA reports.
According to the association's 1997 menu analysis study, a full 92% of restaurant menus offered soup as a selection. That compares with 87% in 1987. The association's Tableservice Trends, 1997, report indicates that 21% of consumer-respondents report buying more soup than they did two years ago.
"Today's soup offerings satisfy more than winter cravings," said Thomas Kershaw, chairman of the board of the NRA.
Some of the more visible takeout soup-shop ventures are located in the Northeast. Manhattan's soup shops include Soup Nutsy, Souperman and Daily Soup, all of which have opened in the last three years. At least two New York metropolitan-area supermarket chains have partnered with one of the trendy soup shops.
As reported in SN, D'Agostino Supermarkets, Larchmont, N.Y., now has Daily Soup-branded, hot-soup programs at four of its Manhattan locations and Food Emporium, Bronx, N.Y., a division of A&P, Montvale, N.J., offers Soup Nutsy varieties prepacked.
