The Real Winner at The U.S Open! What's Your Honey Deuce?
Alexander Zverev beat Ben Shelton in Queens on Sunday. Good match.
I was watching the concession lines.
Because for three weeks every year, the USTA operates what is functionally the highest-margin restaurant company in America, and almost nobody in our industry studies it as one.
They should.
Start With the P&L
In its most recently reported year, the U.S. Open generated $559.6 million in operating revenue against $282.2 million in operating expense. That is a $277.4 million surplus on a 49% operating margin. The tournament produces roughly 90% of the USTA's (United States Tennis Association) annual revenue. (Fortune, Inc.)
The average full-service restaurant in this country nets three to six percent.
Now, the comparison is not apples to apples. The Open has broadcast rights, sponsorship and a monopoly on its own gate. But strip all of that out and you are still left with a food and beverage operation that serves more than 1.1 million guests in under a month, from temporary infrastructure, in one of the most expensive labor markets in the world, and does it without the wheels coming off.
That part is very much our business. And the way they do it is instructive.
One SKU Did $17 Million
In 2025, the Open sold 738,459 Honey Deuces at $23. That is roughly $17 million from a single line item, up 32% year over year. (Inc., ESPN)
There are multi-unit restaurant groups that would trade their entire beverage program for that number.
One drink. Seventeen million dollars. Most restaurants have eighty menu items and no anchor.
The instinct is to say the Open got lucky with a viral cocktail. It did not. The Honey Deuce is the output of four decisions any operator can make, and most do not.
Decision One: Engineer for Throughput First
The drink is vodka, lemonade and raspberry liqueur. It is not complicated, and that is the point. A draft system can reportedly produce one in about twelve seconds. (Forbes)
The garnish, which is the part that photographs, gets pushed entirely off the line. A crew of twenty-plus starts scooping melon by hand around 5:45 a.m., working through thousands of cases of honeydew with roughly 500 melon ballers to produce the three balls that go in every cup. (ESPN)
Read that sequence again, because it is the whole lesson. The complexity lives in prep, where labor is cheap and controllable. The service moment is twelve seconds.
Most restaurants do the opposite. We build signature items that look brilliant on the menu development spreadsheet and then die on a Saturday at 8 p.m. because the complexity sits at the pass.
Decision Two: Distribute the Winner
Open COO Daniel Zausner has pointed out that the Honey Deuce was "once sold from a single stand" and is "now available throughout the US Open grounds." (Inc.)
That is not a small operational note. That is the difference between a signature item and a revenue engine.
When you identify the SKU that carries margin, brand and velocity at the same time, the job is to remove every physical obstacle between the guest and that SKU. Not to protect it as a specialty. Not to keep it at one bar because that is where it started.
Decision Three: The Garnish Is the Marketing Budget
Three melon balls, styled to read as tennis balls, in a souvenir cup.
Guests photograph it. They carry it around the grounds for the rest of the day, which turns every ticket holder into ambient signage. They take it home. Some resell the cups. (ESPN)
The cost of that garnish is measured in cents and a lot of pre-dawn labor. The marketing value is a seven-figure line the Open never has to spend.
Guests do not only buy food. They buy proof that they were there.
If your signature item does not survive being photographed, it is not a signature item. It is just an expensive plate.
Decision Four: Hold the Price
Here is the number that gets the least attention and deserves the most.
The Honey Deuce went from $12 in 2007 to $22 in 2022 to $23 in 2025. And in 2026, with demand at a record and every input cost climbing, they held it at $23. (Inc.)
That is price discipline on a product with effectively zero price resistance. They could have taken it to $26 and sold the same volume this year.
They did not, because the item is load-bearing for the brand, and the brand compounds longer than the extra three dollars does. That is a deliberate trade, and it is the kind of trade most operators never sit down and actually make.
Meanwhile, the Rest of the Model Went Premium
While everyone argued about cocktail prices, the USTA ran a much larger play.
Average ticket price moved from roughly $196 to $346 between 2022 and 2026, a 76% increase. Hospitality revenue doubled from $41 million to $83 million between 2021 and 2024. The $800 million Arthur Ashe renovation expands courtside seating from about 3,000 to 5,000 while eliminating roughly 3,500 mid-priced Loge seats. (Yahoo Finance, Fortune)
They are removing inventory to serve a better customer.
Most restaurant groups will not do this. We keep the underperforming daypart, the low-margin section, the item that does nothing but occupy menu real estate, because cutting feels like shrinking. The Open just demonstrated that subtraction is a growth strategy when you know exactly who you are building for.
The Five Questions
Take this to your next P&L review.
What is your Honey Deuce? Name the single SKU that carries margin, velocity and brand at once. If you cannot name it, that is the finding.
Where does its complexity live? If it is at the pass instead of in prep, you have capped your own volume.
Is it available everywhere a guest might want it, or only where it was invented?
Does it photograph? Does anything leave with the guest?
What are you willing to remove in order to serve your best customer better?
Let's discuss your Honey Deuce. Zverev took home the trophy. The Honey Deuce had the better tournament.
Game. Set. Margin.
Daniel Angerer is a restaurant operating executive and scaling advisor with 20+ years building, opening and scaling hospitality companies. More operator analysis at www.danielangerer.com.
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