 The Billion-Dollar Club |
CHARTS
|
SEGMENTS
|
Last year, 21 of the top 50 chains had systemwide sales of $1 billion or more, but it is a rare year that a chain reaches the billion dollar mark. This year, QSR recognizes three chains for earning their way into the billion-dollar club.
When popular culture would have you believe that selling burgers and fries is so 1950s, Whataburger serves them with pride and reached $1.1 billion in systemwide sales last year. President and COO Preston Atkinson says the chain’s goal is simply to always “serve ‘Whataburger’ every time.”
Atkinson says reaching the billion-dollar mark is “a great motivator and incentive” for Whataburger’s team. “We work hard to get our recognition for the customers we serve,” he says.
As for unit growth, Whataburger will continue to grow into new markets. The chain began in 1950 but is still concentrated in only 10 states. Atkinson says unit metrics will have to rely on what they’ve always relied on: serving that “Whataburger.”
Some 33 years after Whataburger, Panda Express opened its first store and has become the hands-down leader in Asian quick-service with $1.1 billion in systemwide sales last year. Its closest competitor is Pei Wei Asian Diner with a paltry (by comparison) $242 million in sales. Sales have grown more than 20 percent the last several years, and unit growth has been in double digits for quite some time. The plan is for another 160 stores this year.
“Passing the $1 billion mark means that Panda Express has achieved a milestone relatively few restaurant brands have,” says CFO John Theuer. “Achieving the milestone is really a product of doing the right things the right way.
“I think we all at Panda believe this is just a mile marker on a longer road to our ultimate vision of Panda Express as a global brand,” Theuer says.
The youngest chain to make the billion-dollar mark last year has been growing at phenomenal double-digit rates for several years. The first Chipotle opened in 1993 and the chain now has more than 730 units. Year-to-year systemwide sales over the past six years have grown from as little as 30 percent to as much as 43 percent. Unit growth rates over the same period hit a low of 19 percent and a high of 34 percent. Chipotle plans a record 130–140 new stores in 2008.
“It’s certainly nice to have crossed the billon-dollar mark,” says spokesman Chris Arnold. “But we’re more proud of other accomplishments. We are changing the way the world thinks about and eats fast food, and I think that’s pretty profound.
“Our focus on doing just a few things, but doing them better than anyone else, has worked very well for us,” Arnold says. “And we think it will continue to work well for us going forward.”