Brinker International (NYSE: EAT - option chain) stock is falling today after the company announced it has entered into a deal to open 25 Chili's Bar and Grill casual dining restaurants in Russia, starting with the first in late 2010. Traders are not reacting well to this news, but in my opinion a downturn is the best time to consider expansion if you can afford the costs. If you think this stock won't be falling too far in the coming months, then it could be a good time to look at a bullish hedged play on EAT.

This morning, EAT opened at $13.85. So far today the stock has hit a low of $13.68 and a high of $13.97. As of 11:35, EAT is trading at $13.80, down 27 cents (-1.9%). The chart for EAT looks neutral and S&P gives EAT a neutral 3 STARS (out of 5) hold ranking.

Among all the layoffs at tech companies and banks, layoffs at restaurants are barely a plink-plink-plink dropping in the unemployment bucket. Restaurant employees, after all, often work more than one job and variable hours, and turnover is extremely high. It's not one of those made-for-Hollywood scenes when restaurants lay off employees (with the conference room filled with HR consultants and stacks of separation agreements); the picture looks more like gradual reduction in hours until one day you're just not on the schedule. Or, one cocktail waitress at this location, a hostess at the other location, handing in their aprons and their time cards. Perhaps it's just that applicants for empty jobs never get a call back, no matter how awesome their experience.

The Wall Street Journal today evaluates a report that jobs at food service establishments have decreased for five months in a row, and says waiters and waitresses are earning less in tips. Once-darlings of Wall Street, Brinker International (NYSE: EAT)'s Chili's and Starbucks (NASDAQ: SBUX) have seen many outlets close. To blame: it's the economy, naturally, with patrons eating out less, downscaling to fast food for family nights out, ordering less expensive food, and reducing tips from 20%-plus to exactly 15%. Adding insult to injury is the half-of-minimum-wage pay that servers and bartenders are paid in many states: it's been $2.13 an hour since I graduated high school (I can still remember the ignomy when my $21 weekly paycheck from the little Lexington, Virginia pub where I worked in college bounced -- that's how you know your employer is struggling!).

These aren't good times to work in the restaurant industry, or invest in anything but the bare-bones-est of eating establishments.