Earlier this week, my colleague Joe Guszkowski noted that the foot traffic data firm Placer.ai reported that Chili’s traffic was 23% in the last three months of 2024.
“Doubtful,” I responded.
Now, to be fair, Chili’s same-store traffic was actually 19.9%, so technically I was correct. And I did add, for the record, that I thought it would be up “big.”
But it also demonstrates just how crazy a quarter the casual-dining chain just had, and how unbelievable the chain’s performance has been.
Outside of the post-pandemic unleashing of pent-up demand on the world’s restaurants, we don’t recall ever seeing a casual-dining chain—and a traditional bar and grill chain at that—doing anything like 31.4% same-store sales numbers.
Indeed, our data goes back to 2007. No publicly-traded, full-service chain has done anything close to what Chili’s just did. The best number we could find: Fleming’s Prime Steakhouse generated 18.4% same-store sales in the fourth quarter of 2010.
But keep in mind the company was coming off steep, negative numbers during the Great Recession.
Chili’s current run of double-digit same-store sales is not cheap and is not the result of easy comparisons. The chain has reported nothing but positive numbers since the pandemic. Only uber-consistent Texas Roadhouse can match that among full-service concepts.
The 31.4% comes on top of 5% a year ago, making it 36.4%. That is comparable to—but not better than—the two-year number of the gold standard of quarterly earnings sales results, Popeyes’ fourth quarter of 2019. It is generally in the same ballpark as Wingstop in the second quarter of last year.
Popeyes during that quarter reported 37.9% same-store sales, the best, non-pandemic quarterly performance we could find. (More remarkably: Most of that came in the second half of the quarter, after its Chicken Sandwich was introduced.)
Wingstop reported a 28.7% same-store sales number in the second quarter of last year. But that figure came on top of double-digit comps a year earlier, making its two-year figure a stupid 45.5%.
Chili’s bests Wingstop on a one-year report, but can’t quite meet it on a two-year figure.
But none of that is really the point. Both Wingstop and Popeyes have an advantage in that they’re limited-service chains that are built to churn customers. Popeyes has drive-thrus. Wingstop has a substantial digital presence.
And consumers have been shifting to limited-service brands for years, giving these chains a distinct advantage compared with a full-service sector that’s been losing share for years.
While we can’t find anything close to the numbers Chili’s is producing among casual-dining brands, we can find periodic strong performances among limited-service chains. Domino’s, for instance, had a run of 11 quarters in which it did double-digit same-store sales in eight of them. Chipotle, McDonald’s, Habit, Shake Shack and others have taken turns reporting runs of strong sales based on marketing, IPO boosts and other benefits.
Indeed, one fast-casual chain is on a remarkable run of its own right now in Cava. While the Mediterranean chain has yet to report its most recent earnings, it has reported double-digit comps in seven of eight quarters, including 20%-plus numbers in two of them.
And, in fact, its third-quarter, 21% performance, coming off 14.1% a year earlier, is itself an ultra-strong, 35.1%, two-year sales result that earns its own praise.
In short, Chili’s is simply doing something we haven’t seen before.