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Hooters restaurants keep disappearing as iconic chain loses longtime locations in founding state
By Peter Burke
Published October 05, 2026
Hooters has lost its last restaurant in Jacksonville, Florida, marking the latest longtime location to disappear as closures continue following the chain's bankruptcy restructuring.
The Hooters on San Jose Boulevard was permanently closed after operating in Jacksonville for four decades, according to local reports.
The restaurant, which opened in 1986, was the last remaining Hooters in the Jacksonville area, WJXT-TV reported.
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Its closure leaves Hooters without a location in northeast Florida and creates another sizable gap in the restaurant chain's footprint in its home state.
The northernmost Hooters on Florida's Atlantic coast now appears to be in Daytona Beach, according to the company's online restaurant locator.
The last remaining Hooters in Jacksonville, Florida, recently closed for good after 40 years in business. (USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect)
Hooters confirmed to Fox News Digital that the restaurant had closed but didn't elaborate.
Jacksonville isn't the only longtime Hooters location in Florida to recently close for good.
The Hooters in Panama City Beach closed its doors in September after more than 30 years in business, according to a post on its Facebook page.
The closure leaves Pensacola Beach as the chain's remaining outpost in the Florida Panhandle.
Another Hooters in Hickory, North Carolina, also closed in late September after years in business, according to a report by the U.S. Sun.
Hooters waitresses won't be a sight in Panama City Beach, where the location closed in September after more than 30 years in business. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)
The recent shutdowns come months after the closure of the Hooters in Boca Raton, Florida, which had developed a large social media following.
That restaurant closed in February after 16 years when its landlord declined to renew the lease, the restaurant's operator previously told Fox News Digital.
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Its departure created another significant gap along Florida's Atlantic coast, with no Hooters locations between Fort Lauderdale and West Melbourne, about 150 miles apart.
The scattered closures come after Hooters underwent a major restructuring that dramatically reduced the iconic restaurant chain's footprint.
In June 2025, Hooters announced the closure of a "select number" of restaurants, telling Fox News Digital at the time that such decisions are "never easy."
Hooters of America filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in March 2025 as the company struggled with debt and changing consumer habits.
After the Clearwater, Florida-based Hooters Inc., which founded the original Hooters concept in 1983, and another franchise ownership group assumed control of the brand, dozens of restaurants across multiple states were subsequently closed as part of its restructuring efforts.
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In June 2025, Hooters announced the closure of a "select number" of restaurants, telling Fox News Digital at the time that such decisions are "never easy."
Several Hooters locations throughout the country were closed last year amid the restaurant chain's bankruptcy restructuring. More locations have closed in 2026. (Brian Brainerd/The Denver Post via Getty Images)
The company emerged from bankruptcy with a strategy centered on a predominantly franchise-operated business model that returns Hooters to its original roots.
Hooters Inc. CEO Neil Kiefer previously told Fox News Digital that the brand had become oversexualized, and he hoped to reemphasize the food and hospitality while broadening the appeal to families and younger customers after years in which some corporate locations had become, in his words, "little boys' club stores."
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Despite the restructuring, individual Hooters restaurants are continuing to close in 2026.
The Hooters in Fayetteville, North Carolina, which opened in 1994, closed in May, according to local reports, and the Mall of America Hooters in Minnesota closed in March after 33 years, FOX 9 in the Twin Cities reported.
Hooters has also opened a new location in Florida and has plans to open at least one more. The Villages location, a retirement community about 45 miles northwest of Orlando, opened with much fanfare in July 2025, becoming the first new restaurant since the bankruptcy restructuring.
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A planned location in Lutz near Tampa is coming soon, according to the Hooters website.
https://www.foxnews.com/food-drink/hooters-restaurants-keep-disappearing-iconic-chain-loses-longtime-locations-founding-state