McDonald’s sales are more than its next three competitors combined. Subway is on the verge of having to open stores within its own stores in order to keep growing. Panera Bread defines fast-casual. Starbucks is still selling more four-dollar cups of coffee than anyone ever thought possible. Mexican food is as popular as burgers and fries. But smoothies? Can there really be a smoothie chain in the top 50? In a year like Fiscal 2006, the answer is yes.

“My sense from a conservative perspective is that it was a pretty decent year,” says Dennis Lombardi, executive vice president of foodservice strategies at WD Partners. “Generally speaking, the industry grew about 5.5 to 6 percent last year.”

As a whole, the QSR 50 grew 5.7 percent in systemwide sales and 4.9 percent in unit counts compared to 6.9 percent growth in sales and 1.7 percent in units in 2005. Seven chains reported negative systemwide sales changes in 2006 compared to four in the previous year.

Quick-service didn’t experience the mid-year slump that casual dining faced in 2006. According to Lombardi, the year in casual dining started out good but began to decline around the first part of the summer and continued until late third or early fourth quarter. Lombardi says that the increase in gas prices in the spring caught up with consumers as they received their credit card bills a few months later. In addition, credit card companies changed the way they figured debt repayment, driving minimum payments higher. The effect, Lombardi says, is that consumers just stopped going to casual dining, leading to a slower-than-usual 6 percent growth in sales.

But life in quick-serve hasn’t been a bed of roses either. Over the last few years, it has become chic to bash fast food and the big yellow “M” has become the easy target. Sit among a group of young adults and you hear how they would never set foot in a McDonald’s. They must be going through the drive-thru because McDonald’s continues to show more growth than a so-called “mature” chain should, growing at almost 6 percent in systemwide sales and unit volumes on nearly static unit growth. Somebody still likes Big Macs.

The Plan to Win continues its focus on growth through unit measures. Several months ago McDonald’s announced it would open 800 units but close 400 in 2007. That net effect combined with a plan to re-image 2,000 stores means we are likely to continue to see growth in sales and annual unit volumes with fairly flat unit growth.