Dave & Buster's posted a loss. Its Texas bars posted a tenth straight month of growth while the neighbors fell 16%.

A $12.5 million quarterly loss, a 13% after-hours drop, and audited Texas beverage receipts that went the other way for the tenth month running while the rest of the Texas eatertainment index fell 15.9%.

Dave & Buster's missed on revenue and earnings and fell 13% after hours. Audited Texas beverage receipts at its 13 comparable venues rose 3.8% in July, a tenth straight month, while the rest of the Texas eatertainment index fell 15.9%.

Key takeaways

  • D&B reported a $12.5 million net loss for the quarter ended August 4, missed revenue and earnings, fell 13% after-hours; comps −2.9%; F&B comps +7.6%, alcohol +5.6% to $60.1M.
  • Audited Texas beverage receipts at the 13 venues open ≥18 months rose 3.8% in July — the tenth straight same-store month; May–July +9.5% on 16 venues ($4.13M).
  • The rest of the Texas eatertainment index fell 15.9% over those three months on 81 venues (Topgolf −20%, Alamo Drafthouse −16%, Chicken N Pickle −21%, Andretti −20%, Puttshack −24%, Bowlero/Lucky Strike −13%); D&B, Main Event and Round1 were the only brands growing.
  • The World Cup wasn't the reason: host-metro bars grew 6.9% June–July vs 9.0% outside; wider index host metros underperformed the rest of the state.
  • Main Event turning — 13 of 22 Texas venues grew in July, the fourth straight majority month, longest since early 2022; TTM still −3.3%.
  • Killeen, opened May 2025, shows the year-two fade: $126K first month, $44K same month a year later.

Third in a series: April: the brand-level split, August: the bar isn't the problem.

What the quarter said

Revenue $544.1M (−2.4%), adjusted EBITDA $98.9M from $129.8M, −$0.27/share vs Street profit; entertainment revenue 61% of the business, down 8.8%. F&B comps +7.6%, fifth straight positive quarter; 10-Q splits food + non-alcoholic $151.4M (+11.3%), alcohol $60.1M (+5.6%); special events a seventh quarter; monthly cadence improved −5.0% June to −1.6% July.

Ten months

Every month since October 2025 the 13-venue same-store base is up (Oct +7.2%, Nov +6.7%, Dec +5.4%, thin winter +2.5%/+0.6%/+1.2%, Apr +6.9%, May +14.0%, Jun +11.0%, Jul +3.8%). Widen to any venue filing both months and the fourteenth is Killeen (opened May 5, 2025), which drops +1.7% for July and +4.2% May–July; both cells true, small cell — descriptive, not statistical. All-store: 16 Texas D&B filed in July including Sugar Land and McKinney, $4.13M May–July +9.2%; 16 of 18 Texas stores covered (Austin South and Lubbock not). Eleven of 13 legacy bars grew Jun–Jul combined; Euless +19.8%, Balcones Heights +19.3%, Frisco +14.4%, McAllen +13.7%, Dallas +13.0%; Austin −0.8%, Shenandoah −4.5%; Katy Freeway flat +0.5% on $411K.

Neighbors

D&B and Main Event out, the other twelve fell 12.3% May, 17.9% June, 17.3% July on 79–81 venues; Topgolf out too and 68 venues −13.4%; Topgolf −19.9%/−20.8%/−18.9%; Alamo Drafthouse 13 venues −21% in July; Chicken N Pickle five −24%; Andretti five −21%; Bowlero/Lucky Strike 16 venues −10.6%. July wasn't incomplete — venue counts flat since March, July-to-June ratio inside the last four summers' range; calling it an eatertainment decline, not a Texas bar decline. D&B is taking share of a shrinking Texas eatertainment bar — a different claim from "the turnaround is working." Category comp to benchmark this summer: about −16%, not flat.

Not the stadium

Host-metro legacy bars grew 12.0% June, 1.0% July (6.9% two-month); non-host 9.5% June, 8.5% July (9.0%); pre-tournament Jan–May within a third of a point. Sensitivity: Killeen in the non-host group pulls it to +0.3%, making host metros look like winners — but Killeen's decline has nothing to do with soccer, which is why it sits outside the comparison. Wider index: host metros +1.6% pre-window to −18.5% June–July vs non-host −2.9% to −16.4%; a difference-in-differences read says host metros lost about six points relative to the rest of Texas — a contrast, not causal.

Main Event

April +5.3%, May +2.9%, June −0.4%, July +2.1% (16/12/13/13 of 22 up) — longest majority run since early-2022; TTM still −3.3%; DFW/Houston venues improved ~7 points vs the rest of the state during the tournament, the one place a World Cup effect might hide.

Killeen and the honeymoon math

~26 non-comparable stores working through year-two declines; Killeen bar $126K opening month, $128K June, $74K July, $49–83K winter, $44K this May, $66K June, $51K July — second year roughly half the first; why new-store openings are cut to five next year; why the 13-venue cell leads: admitting a store the month it laps a soft-open filing prints +317% one month and −65% the next.

The remodel we can't yet credit

Balcones Heights is the one Texas remodel completed this fiscal year — +27% April, +53% May, +16% June, +24% July vs +5/10/10/2% the other twelve legacy venues; beats the cohort 22 points in July. Can't hand it to the remodel: outperformance starts before the work finished, 2025 base weak; attribution waits for Frisco (remodel Aug–Nov, pre-remodel baseline +14.4% Jun+Jul). Friendswood back to +7.1% June+July.

What the bar can and can't tell you

Alcohol is 11% of revenue; Texas D&B + Main Event produced $7.9M May–July (~13% of the $60.1M alcohol line, 15% of stores). Menu prices explain part of the growth: Dallas food-away-from-home inflation 7.0% July, Houston 6.1% August, national alcohol-away-from-home 3.0%; a domestic draft $5, a frozen 'Rita $9.99, Eat & Play Combo $19.99/person — a good share of +4% to +9% is price; volume unknown without a price series. Inputs move the other way: whole wings −35% YoY, boneless breast −42%, cheese blocks −18%; cost 24.5%→24.8% is a mix story. Macro: diesel $5.97 week of Sept 7; Houston gas $2.31 Jan→$3.83 May; unemployment up two to five tenths every Texas metro YoY; Dallas County bar employment −18% Q1. The 10-Q explains the comp decline as "a reduction in walk-in business." The entertainment line, 61% of revenue and down 8.8%, is the number the stock trades on, and nothing in the receipts fixes it. The receipts retire two easy dismissals: it wasn't a stadium, and it isn't a rising tide.

Scorecard

| What we said | What happened | | --- | --- | | Texas D&B alcohol growing, Main Event declining (April) | D&B +4.2% TTM; Main Event positive in three of the last four months | | Nine straight through June, +4.2% TTM (August) | Ten through July, +4.2% TTM on the same 13 venues | | May +13.9%, June +11.0% (August) | Held; July +3.8% | | June carries a World Cup asterisk (August) | Host-metro bars grew less than non-host; asterisk removed | | Main Event's new menu is an unproven flicker (August) | Majority of venues growing four months running | | Topgolf leads Texas eatertainment alcohol at +13.5% (April) | Topgolf Texas −20% May–July | | Friendswood remodel faded to −5.5% (April) | +7.1% June+July | | The bar doesn't fix the company (August) | Bar 11% of revenue, up 5.6%; entertainment down 8.8%; company lost $12.5M |

Next check

August receipts land mid-October — whether the streak reached eleven, whether the index kept falling, what Frisco's bar did in its first remodel month.

Sources: Pourcast audited Texas beverage receipts through July 2026, venue-month grain; D&B Q2 FY2026 earnings release and Form 10-Q for the quarter ended August 4, 2026; Q2 FY2026 earnings call, September 14, 2026; FRED, BLS, EIA and USDA series as labeled. Cells under 25 venues are descriptive. Same-store means the venue filed in the month and in the same month a year earlier; the 13-venue cohort additionally excludes stores open fewer than 18 months.