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☆ Fast food is expensive. Applebee’s and Chili’s are moving in
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-11 | by ( Danielle Wiener-Bronner | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

For them, and the fast food chains they’re now competing against, the stakes are high. “Fast food has gotten really expensive,” Henkes said. On X, Chili’s asked whether Chili’s is better than fast food, and promised rewards to those who said yes. Chili’s also ran video ads comparing its food favorably to fast food burgers. “People go to sit-down restaurants, generally speaking, for different occasions, than they go to fast food restaurants,” he noted.

Persons: New York CNN — McDonald’s, Applebee’s, ” John Peyton, it’s, Peyton, “, ”, Henkes, McDonald’s, Chris Kempczinski, Ian Borden, we’ve, Chili’s, Kevin Hochman, Chili's, Jeffery Greenberg, David Henkes, ” Henkes Organizations: New, New York CNN, Dine Brands, CNN, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Bloomberg, Applebee’s, Brinker International, Universal, “ Locations: New York, McDonald’s, Applebee’s, Chili’s, Technomic

☆ The rapid rise and fall of ghost kitchens
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-14 | by ( Kenneth Niemeyer | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Ghost kitchens are restaurants with no storefront and no seating that customers never see and which only do delivery. Several influencers and celebrities have used ghost kitchens to produce their own lines of food, like YouTuber Jimmy Donaldson, known online as Mr. AdvertisementAnd as quality issues and late delivery times worsen, some ghost kitchens are starting to see legal challenges. Cracker Barrel also opened its own virtual restaurant using CloudKitchens, another ghost kitchen group, according to Restaurant Business. The company owns three virtual brands, Banda Burrito, The Meltdown, and Burger Den.

Persons: —, Jimmy Donaldson, Burger, Noah Schnapp, It's, TenderFix, Brinker, Kevin Hochman, Donaldson, MrBeast, Travis Kalanick, Kelli Valade Organizations: Service, Business, The New York Times, Kroger, Times, Restaurant Business, Banda, Denny's

☆ This iconic jingle is making a comeback, and you won’t be able to get it out of your head
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-14 | by ( Jordan Valinsky | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

The jingle, last used in the mid-2000s, became an earworm for anyone watching TV during the ’90s when it seemingly blanketed the airwaves nonstop. Chili’s is hoping that nostalgia will draw renewed interest in the restaurant chain that’s in the midst of a turnaround. The new TV ad, featuring Boyz II Men singing a modernized version of the jingle, will also be promoted on social media this month. “It feels natural for us to rerelease the ‘Baby Back Ribs’ jingle and pay homage to Chili’s legendary menu item in a nostalgic way,” the group said in a release. The latest version is the “biggest rerelease of Chili’s iconic earworm yet and doesn’t stray too far from the original version,” the chain said.

Persons: Boyz, Guy Bommarito, Chili’s, Bommarito, ”, Kevin Hochman, Brinker, Hochman, they’re “ Organizations: New, New York CNN, GSD, Brinker International, KFC, Brinker Locations: New York

☆ Brinker International CEO Kevin Hochman goes one-on-one with Jim Cramer
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-01 | by ( Jim Cramer | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: 1 min

Brinker International CEO Kevin Hochman goes one-on-one with Jim CramerBrinker International President and CEO Kevin Hochman joins 'Mad Money' host Jim Cramer to talk quarterly earnings, changing consumer trends and more.

Persons: Kevin Hochman, Jim Cramer Brinker, Jim Cramer Organizations: Brinker, Jim Cramer Brinker International

☆ Popeyes overtakes KFC as No. 2 chicken chain, but Chick-fil-A stays on top
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-04 | by ( Amelia Lucas | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

2 chicken chain in the U.S., a decade after Chick-fil-A first unseated KFC from the top spot. Restaurant Brands International 's Popeyes launched a chicken sandwich in 2019 that turned into a blockbuster menu item and ushered in the chicken sandwich wars. Similar to KFC, Popeyes lost market share in the past year, but still retained enough to leapfrog its rival. It took more than a year for KFC to respond to Popeyes' chicken sandwich. 2 chicken chain.

Persons: Popeyes, Chick, Wendy's, Kevin Hochman, Patrick Doyle, Sami Siddiqui Organizations: KFC, Starbucks, Restaurant Brands, Yum Brands, Barclays, Brinker International, School Conference, CNBC Locations: U.S, Atlanta

☆ Brinker International CEO on the state of the restaurant industry, industry softness and Q4 earnings
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-21 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: 1 min

Share Share Article via Facebook Share Article via Twitter Share Article via LinkedIn Share Article via EmailBrinker International CEO on the state of the restaurant industry, industry softness and Q4 earningsBrinker International CEO Kevin Hochman joins 'Power Lunch' to discuss the company's Q4 earnings, the state of the restaurant industry and the rising cost of food.

Persons: Kevin Hochman Organizations: Brinker

☆ 'We're working on the right things to accelerate growth', says Brinker's CEO Kevin Hochman
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-07 | by ( Jim Cramer | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: 1 min

'We're working on the right things to accelerate growth', says Brinker's CEO Kevin HochmanBrinker International President and CEO Kevin Hochman joins 'Mad Money' host Jim Cramer fresh off the company's investor day which saw the stock drop more than 6% during the trading day.

Persons: Kevin Hochman Brinker, Kevin Hochman, Jim Cramer Organizations: Kevin Hochman Brinker International

☆ Chili's has become the gold standard for restaurant service in these inhospitable times
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-31 | by ( Alex Bitter | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Chili's has hired staff to bus tables and streamlined preparation, according to the New York Times. Some have found it at Chili's, according to the New York Times. In the early years of the pandemic, Chili's experimented with technology, such as a robot server, to handle the labor shortage and increase efficiency. "When you go out to eat you want to be waited on, and that hasn't changed," Hochman told the Times. Jasmine Owens, a longtime bartender at a Chili's outside of Atlanta, told the Times that customers would scream and toss their food during the pandemic.

Persons: Chili's, —, Kevin Hochman, Hochman, hasn't, Jasmine Owens, Owens Organizations: New York Times, Service, Times, Brinker International, Restaurant Industry Locations: Chili's, Dallas, State, Atlanta

☆ Diners Are Fed Up With Minimal Service. Will a Little Warmth Win Them Back?
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-30 | by ( Kim Severson | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Leann Emmert and Katrina Elder, who work in the film industry, used to spend weekends checking out the newest Los Angeles restaurants. The couple has been largely sticking to a neighborhood restaurant with consistently good food and that everybody-knows-your-name feeling. “Great food in the absence of hospitality is not a great value,” he said. He told managers to hire workers to bus tables, a task that in recent years had fallen largely on servers. He simplified both the tablets that servers use to take orders and the way some dishes are prepared and plated.

☆ Jim Cramer goes one-on-one with Brinker International CEO Kevin Hochman
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( Jim Cramer | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: 1 min

Jim Cramer goes one-on-one with Brinker International CEO Kevin HochmanBrinker International CEO Kevin Hochman joins 'Mad Money' host Jim Cramer to talk the company's quarterly earnings results, changes in Chili's restaurants, and menu updates.

☆ How Chili’s Is Prepping for Tough Times, Starting With the Fries
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-04 | by ( Heather Haddon | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

When Kevin Hochman became CEO last June of the company that owns Chili’s Bar & Grill, amid a labor shortage and escalating costs, he started looking for bottlenecks in the kitchen. There, he learned about Chili’s french-fry problem. Fries were delivered in their own metal baskets, driving cooks and dishwashers crazy. They had to be lined with paper before each serving and cleaned afterward, some 40 million times a year. In short order, Mr. Hochman scrapped the baskets for fries, advancing his grand ambitions for the Southwest-style restaurant chain: improve service and boost profits.

☆ Chili's CEO bought grills that can cook a medium steak in under 3 minutes — and says they could shave more than $5 million in losses from unhappy customers
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-09 | by ( Nancy Luna | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Over the summer, Chili's was testing drone delivery and dining-room robots to improve operations. But, under new CEO Kevin Hochman, Brinker-owned Chili's ditched robots in favor of kitchen automation. "The robotics were slower than what our servers can do," Hochman told Insider. "The robotics were slower than what our servers can do," Hochman told Insider. That alone is likely to save the company millions of dollars from having to comp steaks sent back by unhappy customers.

☆ This startup just hired a former DoorDash exec to bring robotic restaurant delivery to the masses
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-11 | by ( Nancy Luna | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

When it comes to amassing a large food-delivery footprint, the startup has hired a ringer in the delivery sector — the former DoorDash executive Prahar Shah. Serve's robots have the potential to be ubiquitous in our everyday lives, he said. This is "very similar to part of the playbook that we ran at DoorDash," Shah said. Most of Serve's restaurant partnerships have been with local restaurants in Los Angeles, such as Bossa Nova and Lala's Grill. As he approaches restaurant chains in his new role, he said most understand the necessity of automation.

Others have ground to a halt, sending companies back to technology that is less sci-fi, but can be deployed more quickly and cost-effectively. Some companies are satisfied their robots are doing the job. The perils of the outdoors are a big problem for delivery robots, in particular. Some people have also raised concerns that delivery robots could block wheelchair access on sidewalks or otherwise get in the way of humans, leading local authorities to limit or prohibit their use. Toronto, for example, last December banned delivery robots.

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