Wag's was a chain of

casual dining Restaurants fall into several industry classifications, based upon menu style, preparation methods and pricing, as well as the means by which the food is served to the customer. This article mainly describes the situation in the USA, while catego ...

(or "

family Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...

") restaurants owned and operated by

Walgreens Walgreen Company, d/b/a Walgreens, is an American company that operates the second-largest pharmacy store chain in the United States behind CVS Health. It specializes in filling prescriptions, health and wellness products, health information, an ...

in the 1970s and 1980s. They were modeled after restaurants like

Denny's Denny's (also known as Denny's Diner on some of the locations' signage) is an American table service diner-style restaurant chain. It operates over 1,700 restaurants in many countries. Description Originally opened as a Diner, coffee shop un ...

Shoney's Shoney's is an American restaurant chain headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. It operates restaurants in 17 states, primarily in the South with additional locations in the Midwest and lower Mid-Atlantic states. Founder Alex Schoenbaum opene ...

, and Big Boy in that they were mostly 24-hour establishments specializing in inexpensive fare such as

hamburgers A hamburger, or simply burger, is a food consisting of fillings—usually a patty of ground meat, typically beef—placed inside a sliced bun or bread roll. Hamburgers are often served with cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, pickles, bacon, or ...

and breakfast. The chain was based on smaller restaurants that existed in some of the larger Walgreens stores. Walgreens sold all 91 freestanding stores to

Marriott Corporation Marriott Corporation was a hospitality company that operated from 1927 until 1993, founded by J. Willard Marriott and Frank J. Kimball as Hot Shoppes, Inc. In 1957, Marriott Corporation opened its first hotel in Arlington County, Virginia, Ar ...

in 1988, retaining only a few locations that were situated in malls. Soon after this, Marriott began selling off its assets, including Marriott's Great America. Unable to find a buyer for most of the restaurants, the Wag's chain was completely out of business by 1991. However, the 30 Wag's restaurants in the Chicago Metropolitan area were sold to Lunan Corporation (large

Arby's Arby's is an American fast food sandwich restaurant chain with more than 3,300 restaurants system wide and third in terms of revenue. In October 2017, '' Food & Wine'' called Arby's "America's second largest sandwich chain (after Subway)". Ar ...

franchisee in Chicago) and run by Lunan Family Restaurants. Over the course of 2 years, each Wag's restaurant continued to do business as Wag's until converted to a Shoney's restaurant. Lunan Family Restaurants went out of business in 1994 and the Shoney's locations were sold to various chains or individuals. Some locations continue to this day as IHOP restaurants. Marriott itself ceased operations in 1993, when they split into two new entities.

References

Regional restaurant chains in the United States Defunct restaurant chains in the United States {{US-restaurant-stub

See also

References