The Cheesecake Factory: Unapologetic about its campaign to kill you

"When people eat at home, they want to eat low cal, but when they go out to dine, they really want every calorie they're paying for," says David Overton, CEO of The Cheesecake Factory. "Because it's celebratory, they're here, they want to have a good time.

David Overton

That quote from the chain's 65-year-old founder comes from a recent interview with ABC News.  It made me race for the Google's image search, hoping to find a photo. Was the man overweight and perhaps skirting with poor health himself? I wanted to indulge a fantasy that karma would come back around to punish him for pushing some of the most outrageous and over-sized restaurant foods in America.

The photo of him from several websites appears to be the kind of corporate CEO portrait handed out by the PR department. It shows a round-faced man with full cheeks and a blossoming second chin on top of what appears to be a large frame.

Perhaps Overton's eaten a few too many of his chain's Farmhouse Burgers, topped with bacon, mayo and a fried egg. It seems telling that the company's website doesn't include a section on nutritional analysis. Most other chains do at least that.

The large portions, he says, are "what America wants to eat."

Certainly, his chain's status as one of the industry's most profitable chains backs him up. But hasn't he ever heard of corporate responsibility? And if not that, how about enlightened self interest? That may be at work with the company's recently-introduced SkinnyLicious (TM) Menu

Let's hope the effort is catching when it comes to the rest of the menu. When his current customer base succumbs to Type 2 Diabetes and premature death, who will line up at his restaurants then?