A Guide to the New Workday Lunch—And How Much It’s Going to Cost

ON HIS FIRST DAY back in his New York City office in July, Syed Ali found his biggest challenge, oddly, was lunch. After months of reheating leftovers to eat during Zoom calls, he was looking forward to a sit-down culinary adventure. Sadly, two of his go-to lunch spots had closed. The local outpost of salad chain Sweetgreen was still there but only allowed for online orders. In the end, Mr. Ali, an urban planner, spent most of his break wandering the still mostly empty streets near his Tribeca workplace before finally grabbing a sandwich to eat back at HQ.

First-world problem? Maybe. But uncertainty about who returns to the office, when and how frequently is making it tricky to predict what lunch will look like in a post-pandemic world. Restaurants, from fast food to fine dining, have invested millions in digital ordering, pickup and delivery to make lunch quick and frictionless, and are praying that after this last annus horribilis those investments prove sound. At the same time, office workers who were stuck at home for more than a year are yearning for human contact, which means lunches that are leisurely and social—or at least require them to leave their desks.

Heading into fall, restaurants and their customers face a swirl of questions and contradictory trends. One thing is clear: Lunch, like nearly everything else in our lives, is changing. Here, a preview.

Lunch is the new happy hour

Like many office workers before the pandemic, Philadelphia psychologist Erin Hadley prioritized a fast lunch. The shorter her lunch break, the sooner she could return to her patients and get home to her young son. But starting in September, she hopes to be in the office at most two days a week, so a leisurely sit-down lunch—she dreams of the seafood tower at the Oyster House in Center City—seems both reasonable and a key opportunity to catch up with friends. “I want to be more mindful of the time I can spend with people,” she said.

In other words, a day at the office suddenly feels less like drudgery and more like a day out. Mr. Ali, the urban planner, said that before the pandemic he often brought lunch to work. But like many professionals, he managed to save more money than usual last year—in part by not going out to lunch. Now he is happy to splurge on the days he actually goes to work.