With smoking having been long intertwined with the American dining-out experience, the trend to ban smoking in restaurants has led many people in the restaurant industry to conclude that a reduction in sales will certainly result. Yet these fears, flamed by the tobacco industry, have never come to fruition.
Restaurateurs believe that providing a comfortable environment for their customers is key to the success of their business and many feel that allowing patrons to smoke is an essential part of that comfort. They believe that, if they cant have a cigarette with their meal, diners will instead eat at home or find some other food service venue where smoking is allowed.

Does banning smoking in restaurants present any sort of economic risk? In areas where smoking bans are already in place do people eat out less often, and spend less money in restaurants? If there is no evidence of economic loss in areas where smoking is banned, why do such worries persist?

In California, where the country's strictest smoking ban has been in effect since 1995, restaurant sales did not suffer for the industry as a whole or on a per-unit basis. The smoking ban in bars, which started three years later, did not effect sales either.
 

But in key tourist areas like California's Lake Tahoe, which shares a literal walk-across-the street border with ban-free Nevada, diners could, but have chosen not to abandon California restaurants. California-side Lake Tahoe restaurants have successfully dealt with the issue of having to step outside to smoke in cold weather too.