Darden Restaurants Provides Updated Media & Communications Contacts

ORLANDO, Fla., Oct. 12 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Darden Restaurants, Inc., the world's largest casual dining restaurant company and owner of Red Lobster, Olive Garden, Bahama Breeze, Smokey Bones Barbeque & Grill and Seasons 52 restaurants, today announced new media contacts for Darden, Bahama Breeze and Smokey Bones.

(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20050203/FLTH026LOGO ) Below are the media contacts for Darden and each of its brands: Red Lobster Wendy Spirduso, 407-245-6546, cell 407-701-3215, wspirduso@redlobster.com Denise Wilson, 407-245-6547, cell 407-701-3230, dwilson@redlobster.com Olive Garden Steve Coe, 407-245-4923, cell 407-492-6798, scoe@olivegarden.com Mara Frazier, 407-245-5161, cell 407-256-7316, mfrazier@olivegarden.com Bahama Breeze Mike Bernstein, 407-245-5270, cell 407-353-4242, mbernstein@darden.com Smokey Bones Joe Chabus, 407-245-4563, cell 407-491-3206, jchabus@smokeybones.com Seasons 52 Deborah Robison, 407-245-6396, cell 407-256-6436, drobison@seasons52.com Darden Restaurants Nathan DeVault, 407-245-4951, cell 407-341-1726, nathandevault@costadevault.com

Darden Restaurants, Inc. , headquartered in Orlando, Fla., owns and operates nearly 1,400 restaurants and leads the casual dining restaurant industry in sales and market share. The company employs 150,000 people, records annual sales of $5.3 billion and serves 300 million meals annually.