This week on the Extra Serving podcast, a product of Nation’s Restaurant News, NRN editors Holly Petre, Sam Oches, and Bret Thorn talked about recent restaurant earnings.
This week, the earnings conversation will focus on Chipotle, which saw massive gains during the fourth quarter. The fast-casual chain bucked all trends with a same-store sales increase of 8.4% with a 7.4% increase in transactions compared to a 1.6% decline industrywide. The editors talked about how Chipotle has managed to exceed both analyst and industry expectations and what this means for the future of Chipotle as it looks to have 7,000 restaurants shortly.
Then, the editors talked about the future of burgers. Several chains have revamped their burger offerings within the past few months, maybe as a reaction to chicken overtaking much of the beef business these past few years. The biggest name on the list we compiled was McDonald’s. When the chain introduced its “best burgers ever” and rolled it out systemwide in January, it was a big statement considering the chain was built on its burger. Will this help some of these brands that have been struggling? And will it bring consumers back to beef?
Finally, NRN’s editor-in-chief Oches talked about two of our big projects: Burger Showdown and Breakout Brands.
This week, you’ll hear an exclusive conversation between Oches and Robert Byrne of Technomic. They dove deep into America’s Favorite Chains.