I left in the summer of 1991 to head to medical school. I started as a cook, moved to waiter, then back to cook, then to bartender for the last couple of years. My friend stayed with the company and moved up through management, general manager, regional manager, then franchise store owner. I'm a minority owner in his Cheddar's in Missouri. The Bedford store was the third Cheddar's ever to exist and the employees from that store helped with the openings of subsequent Cheddar's in South Arlington, Desoto, etc. I worked there when it was pretty small time. They are a much better restaurant now than they were back then. The corporate stores were recently bought by Darden, which owns Olive Garden and Longhorn Steakhouse and others. It will be interesting to see what they will do with the brand. Hopefully, they don't ruin it. That would be a bigger travesty than Whataburger in my world.
Darden will likely come around to our store in Missouri wanting to buy it back. It has been a great source of "mailbox money" over the past decade. It was supposed to develop into several locations in Missouri, but Cheddar's stopped allowing franchises soon after ours opened.
I know the son of the owner is one of the ones who made the decision to sell to Darden and he immediately regretted it. It has been a gold mine for the owners and they likely let it go far too cheap from what I have heard.