Which New Jersey restaurant began a Taco Tuesday promotion on February 6, 1979?

Gregory’s Restaurant & Bar began a Taco Tuesday promotion on February 6, 1979. The family-owned restaurant is in Somers Point, New Jersey, near Atlantic City.

Gregory Gregory had noticed long lines for tacos at a Philadelphia shopping-center food court and believed the unfamiliar dish could attract customers to his family’s establishment. After the restaurant rejected tacos as a permanent menu item, he proposed serving them as a weekly special instead. He chose Tuesday partly to compete with a popular Wednesday-night promotion at a nearby club.

The first event was modest: Gregory’s reportedly sold five orders, then offered three tacos for a dollar. The promotion gradually grew into a local institution. The restaurant used hard shells and a Tex-Mex-style filling rather than the soft tacos more commonly associated with many Mexican regional traditions.

The date is part of the later Taco Tuesday trademark story. Gregory’s obtained a federal registration in 1982, while Taco John’s later held the phrase nationally outside New Jersey for many years. The trademark disputes helped make the restaurant’s origin claim widely known.