MORRISVILLE - A sizeable lunch crowd, mostly workers at commercial businesses along Airport Boulevard, kept the staff at the Babymoon Café on their toes on a recent afternoon.

Waiters scurried salmon and salad to tables as kitchen chatter spilled into the dining room.

Not bad for a Thursday.

But it wasn't the standing-room-only kind of crowd co-owner Yeirdan Ingle might have seen three years ago, when he and a partner bought the Italian restaurant on Jerusalem Drive.

"As we took over, our lunch crowd had really built up," he said. "And then we would find times where we might only fill up one time during a lunch hour instead of twice, probably because people had started to bring their lunch instead of eating out, to save money."

It's a phenomenon that has plagued restaurants across the country in this recession.

But the pain has been especially acute here.

Morrisville is home to one of the region's biggest commercial developments and is adjacent to Research Triangle Park.

Businesses here rely heavily on daytime traffic to pay the bills.

For restaurants, that means lunchtime is show time.

The economic slowdown, which has cut the number of midday regulars, has translated into a big dip in sales at restaurants throughout the town.

"It's become very unpredictable," said Paolo Zoccola, owner of Lubrano's Italian on Keybridge Drive. He says business has fallen about 20 percent over the past three years.

"Before the recession, you had more stability from week to week," he said. "Now, one week you can be really busy and think things are getting better. And then the next week you're back at square one."

Restaurants in other Wake municipalities, such as Cary or Raleigh, can depend on a bigger residential base to sustain breakfast or dinner traffic, driving business throughout the day to cover the rent.

But while Morrisville's population has expanded rapidly over the past decade, restaurateurs say dinner business still has a ways to go.

"The whole thing with us is that our restaurants have strong daytime business because of RTP," said Sharon Rosché, president of the Morrisville Chamber of Commerce. "But that drops off in the evening, when most of those workers go home."

Local initiative

The chamber is now leading a push for a local dining initiative she hopes will help boost restaurants' sales.

Participants in the chamber's Dine Local campaign would be encouraged to stay open for dinner - or keep later hours - at least once a month.

Rosché hopes restaurateurs might offer special discounts to customers on those nights.

"We know they're interested in us pursuing anything that's going to drive business to their door," she said.

Many restaurants in Morrisville say they welcome the chamber's efforts but are already ahead of the game.

At Asian Aroma on Jerusalem Drive, for example, manager Danny Yip said he has been trying different tactics to lure elusive evening diners.

"We mail out menus to Morrisville residents," he said. "And we've been trying to do a $1 noodle soup deal. We've been doing a lot to try to keep people here."

Ditto at Salsa Fresh Mexican Grill on Davis Drive. Owner Russell Blum, a 25-year veteran of the restaurant industry expanded his menu to appeal to a wider audience and has boosted his marketing budget.

"We've added items like fish tacos and party platters to our menu," Blum said. "And we went the longest time without a Web site, but now we have one."

Late last year, he put coupons in local grocery stores and bought an ad in a local magazine. "I've probably done more in the last six months than I did in the prior 10 years just to stay competitive," he said. "We're all fighting for fewer dollars."

On Thursday afternoon, a steady-stream of cars sped by on Interstate 40 about 200 yards beyond the entrance of the Morrisville Outlet Mall.

The only thing moving at the mall's food court was a mop. Of the eight restaurants in the court, only five were open.

Hundreds of seats sat empty while a small cleaning crew swabbed and swept a few crumbs. Two men sat in an alcove with their laptops, enjoying free wireless internet and the silence and solitude rivaling that of a graduate student library.

Bouchaib Mhaidra, manager of the Philly Steak Factory, sat alone behind the counter as the dinner hour approached.

Mhaidra staffs the lunch hours with four employees, but says he can handle the slim dinner crowd all on his own.

He said lunch sales account for 75 percent of his business.

"Without the RTP lunch crowd, we wouldn't be here," he said.

Staff writer Ted Richardson contributed to this report.