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Looking through the below April 1994 pictorial, it’s hard to imagine that such beautiful women could be met serving up hot wings and beer at a local restaurant. But such was the promise of Hooters: fried food and service with a smile by a team of your town’s hotties. While several Hooters locations have closed in recent years—including NYC’s last remaining location in March 2026—that dream is still alive at a few hundred Hooters restaurants throughout the United States and 29 countries. In late 2025, Hooters announced that the company’s founding group had taken back ownership of the chain with the promise of going “back to their roots,” a cleaner, simplified menu and, of course, a continuation of the Hooters girls. “What has always made Hooters special are the thousands of iconic World Famous Hooters Girls,” a press release explains. “As part of the change, all server uniforms will return the original look while staying true to the brand’s original beachy vibe and heritage.” Perhaps what you see below may once again be the Hooters aesthetic. Well, the uniformed photos, anyway.

I myself worked at Hooters for all of two weeks one summer when I was 19 years old. I was flattered to be hired, but clearly did not have the pep and personality required to fulfill the iconic role. Still, I’ll always have love for the brand, and the below pictorial captures why.

— Magdalene J. Taylor, Senior Editor

It’s service with a smile, and a whole lot more, at the hottest food joint in America

THE COLOR orange screams for attention. It’s one of the brightest, most intense colors in the spectrum. It’s almost combustible. Fire is orange. The sun is orange. And orange is the color of the silky, micro gym shorts worn by the Hooters girls. Stare long enough and that orange will burn a hole right through your gray matter. Top off those orange shorts with a tight, white T-shirt (usually knotted in the back to emphasize the chest and bare midriff), and the results are death by Creamsicle. There are worse ways to go.

The Hooters girls flaunt these orange-and-whites at 117 restaurants in the U.S. By the end of this year, that figure could rise to 200. Hooters is fast becoming the McDonald’s of wings-and-beer joints, and the Hooters girls are a big part of that success—and not just because of their skimpy outfits.

It’s an attitude thing. Walk into any Hooters and you’ll be greeted with a smile. The waitresses are so genuinely friendly and energetic, you can’t help but perk up. There’s one Miss Congeniality after another, mixed with a little innocent tease to whip the crowd into a feeding frenzy. When traffic is slow, which is rare, the waitresses usually pull up a chair and chat. “Here’s more Three-Mile Island hot sauce for your chicken wings,” says Liz Ann, who works at the Hooters in Boca Raton, Florida. “Don’t spill it in your lap or you’ll be singing soprano.” Shy, these waitresses aren’t, and that’s half the fun.

Honk if you love the fabulous fivesome parked in front of the original Hooters in Clearwater, Florida: (above, clockwise from the top) Traci McAllister, Sandra Hinzman, Gina Menendez, Dawn Bergquist and Sunday Steward. Short shorts aren’t a no-no here. Banking on that “sex sells” strategy, Hooters rapidly grew from this single restaurant into a nationwide chain.

Chicago’s Nanette DeCosmo (above) would love to own a day-care center, but thinks childish men are a turnoff. Rub-a-dub-dub, the twins in the tub are Little Rock’s Cara and Laura Honea, premed students who enjoy reading and rubber duckies. To make Casey Gray’s (below) heart beat faster, ask her to dance. You’ll find her wearing mile-high dancing shoes wherever they play disco in Denver. Cheryl Ash (below, second) is a hockey nut from Texas, who warns judgmental people that they’re skating on thin ice.

Jennifer McQuistion (below) of Buffalo, New York aspires to be “Al Bundy’s dream girl on Married With Children,” while (below, left to right) Kay Brown, Kym Williams, Lé Toia Francis and shutterbug Cheryl Ash ham it up outside a Dallas Hooters.

Between classes at Old Dominion, horseback riding and playing tennis, Newport News, Virginia’s Melissa Brewster (below) is always on the move. Heidi Mark (below bottom) of West Palm Beach, Florida receives her share of stares, like when she orders her favorite peanut-butter-and-pickle sandwiches.

Good luck slowing down Kym Williams (below). If she’s not working out or playing racquetball, Kym’s turning heads in Dallas’ social scene.

Michelle Armstrong (below) is studying to be a dental hygienist in Jacksonville, but she’s extremely spontaneous and sometimes gets a bounce out of bungee-jumping. Augusta, Georgia’s Renée DeLaporte (below, second) is a little less adventuresome: One of her most daring feats was cutting out PLAYBOY rabbit logos and bringing them to grade school for Easter show-and-tell, where she “got in a lot of trouble.” Sunday Steward (below, third) of Clearwater, Florida has seen a few troublemakers herself. An aspiring court reporter, she’s shown here in her Sunday best.

Jennifer Gallatin (below) boasts that her family is “always there” for her. Jazz lover, gourmet cook and avid dancer Lé Toia Francis (below, second) also knows a little Latin—carpe diem is the phrase this Texan lives by.

Guys who try to play mind games with 19-year-old Summer Shepard (below) of Little Rock haven’t got a chance. She’s a psych major in college. The oldest of five girls, Norcross, Georgia’s Rosario Rubalcava (below, second) can do without sports, preferring the quieter pursuits of sewing or reading. Cheryl Bartel (below, third) of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, on the other hand, can’t keep still. She water-skis, goes scuba diving and finds time to work out.