Chili’s Takes the Fight Beyond Burgers: Why the Restaurant Industry Needs to Stop Thinking in Silos

 

There is an important lesson emerging from Chili’s that reaches far beyond burgers, chicken sandwiches, tacos or even casual dining according to Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

Consumers do not live in restaurant industry silos—and neither should restaurant marketers.

For decades, the restaurant industry has divided itself into categories: quick-service restaurants, fast casual, casual dining, pizza, Mexican, chicken, burgers and convenience stores. But consumers do not wake up in the morning thinking, “Today I am going to purchase from the casual-dining segment.”

They think:

“What do I want to eat, how much do I want to spend, how quickly do I want it, and what am I going to get for my money?”

That distinction is becoming increasingly important.

And Chili’s appears to understand it.

At Brinker International’s September 17, 2026 Investor Day, Chili’s executives Kevin Hochman, president and CEO of Brinker International, and George Felix, EVP and CMO, described a strategy that began by attacking the perceived value gap between casual dining and fast food—and is now looking toward Mexican QSR as another category where Chili’s believes it can compete.

From the perspective of the Grocerant Guru®, this isn't simply a story about Chili’s going after Taco Bell.

It is a story about the continuing collapse of restaurant industry silos.

The Consumer Doesn't Care About Your Industry Category

In 2024, Chili’s made its intentions very clear.

The brand introduced its Big Smasher burger as part of its $10.99 3 For Me platform, explicitly positioning the offer against fast-food burgers. Chili’s said the Big Smasher contained twice the beef of a Big Mac, while the $10.99 meal included the burger, fries, bottomless chips and salsa, and a bottomless non-alcoholic beverage.

The important marketing idea wasn't simply “we have a burger.”

The message was:

“Compare what you get for your money.”

That is a fundamentally different way to market food.

Chili’s subsequently extended the strategy into lunch. Its 2024 3 For Lunch platform offered 11 combinations beginning at $10.99, including burgers, chicken sandwiches, chicken tenders and other familiar lunch choices.

Then came 2025.

Chili’s introduced the Big QP burger with 85% more beef than a Quarter Pounder with Cheese, again putting the comparison squarely into the consumer's frame of reference. The $10.99 3 For Me included the burger, fries, bottomless chips and salsa, and a bottomless drink.

And the results suggest that consumers were paying attention.

For fiscal 2025, Chili’s comparable restaurant sales increased 25.3%, with traffic up 16.0%. In the fourth quarter alone, comparable sales increased 23.7%, including a 16.3% increase in traffic.

Those numbers matter because they demonstrate something more important than a successful advertising campaign:

Consumers were willing to change where they spent their restaurant dollars.

Then Came Chicken

In April 2026, Chili’s moved beyond burgers.

The company introduced the Big Crispy chicken sandwich to its $10.99 3 For Me platform and explicitly compared it with fast-food chicken sandwiches. Chili’s said its average Big Crispy filet was more than 80% larger than the average McCrispy breaded filet in its local study.

Again, the strategy wasn't:

“We are a casual-dining restaurant selling chicken.”

It was:

“Here is what you get for your money. Now compare.”

That is Price Value Service Equilibrium in action.

Price alone isn't value.

Value is the relationship between:

Price + Quality + Service + Experience + Portability = Consumer Value

A $9 meal isn't automatically a better value than a $12 meal.

If the $12 meal provides substantially more food, better ingredients, table service, a comfortable environment and an experience consumers enjoy, the consumer may perceive the $12 purchase as the better value.

That is exactly the battleground Chili's has entered.

Chili's Says Mexican QSR Is Next

At the 2026 Investor Day, Brinker executives discussed Mexican QSR as a potential future growth category.

Importantly, this is not being positioned as an immediate rollout. George Felix described Mexican QSR as a future opportunity, potentially about two years out, while pointing to existing Chili's capabilities in quesadillas and fajitas. Executives discussed potential extensions such as Chicken Crisper tacos, upgraded steak quesadillas and other Mexican-inspired menu applications.

That is strategically significant.

Chili's isn't starting from zero.

It already has:

·       Chicken Crispers

·       Fajitas

·       Quesadillas

·       Mexican-inspired menu items

·       Familiar proteins

·       Sauces and flavor profiles

·       A strong restaurant experience

·       A value platform

·       A marketing system built around comparison

The opportunity is therefore less about entering Mexican food and more about recombining existing assets into new consumer occasions.

That is something the Grocerant Guru® has been calling Mix-and-Match Meal Component Bundling for years.

Take a proven protein.

Take a proven sauce.

Take a familiar format.

Take a recognized brand.

Bundle the components.

Create a new occasion.

Then give the consumer a reason to choose it.

This Is Where the Silos Begin to Break

The restaurant industry has traditionally organized itself around categories.

Burger restaurants compete with burger restaurants.

Chicken restaurants compete with chicken restaurants.

Mexican restaurants compete with Mexican restaurants.

Casual dining competes with casual dining.

But the consumer sees none of those walls.

The consumer sees one wallet.

And that wallet may be deciding between:

·       a burger at McDonald's,

·       tacos at Taco Bell,

·       chicken at Chick-fil-A,

·       a meal at Chili's,

·       pizza for the family,

·       a prepared meal from a supermarket,

·       food from a convenience store,

·       or something delivered to the home.

That's the real competitive landscape.

The consumer's stomach is the marketplace.

The Chili's Numbers Tell an Interesting Story

Chili's fiscal 2024 performance already showed the beginning of the shift.

In fiscal 2024, Chili's comparable restaurant sales increased 7.4%, while traffic declined only 0.6%, with the company specifically citing the Big Smasher launch and value-oriented advertising as traffic drivers in the fourth quarter.

Then fiscal 2025 accelerated dramatically.

Chili's comparable sales increased 25.3%, with traffic increasing 16.0%.

By fiscal 2026, Brinker reported that Chili's had delivered five consecutive years of same-store sales growth, with cumulative growth of 71% over that period. Fiscal 2026 fourth-quarter comparable sales increased 5.6% at Chili's.

Those results help explain why Brinker is now talking about expanding the concept rather than simply defending it.

At Investor Day, Brinker established longer-term targets calling for 4% to 6% annual revenue growth and 2% to 3% annual unit growth, with a goal of reaching approximately 30 new restaurants annually by fiscal 2029.

Value Is Becoming More Than a Discount

This is perhaps the most important lesson.

Chili's executives are not describing value as simply having the lowest price.

They describe an everyday low-price strategy based on price certainty, more food for the money and the overall experience.

The company's executives said the Chili's entry price points can be available without requiring consumers to find a coupon, visit at a specific hour or use a special promotion. They also described the average Chili's check for comparable occasions as roughly $3 to $4 below competitors in casual dining.

That is a very different proposition from traditional promotional marketing.

“Come in today because the coupon expires tonight” creates urgency.

“You know what you're going to get for your money every day” creates trust.

For today's consumer, that distinction matters.

And This Is Where Taco Bell Enters the Conversation

The question isn't really whether Chili's can become Taco Bell.

It doesn't need to.

Nor does Taco Bell need to become Chili's.

The more interesting question is whether consumers will increasingly compare them on the same occasion.

If a consumer wants tacos, the consumer can evaluate Taco Bell.

But that same consumer can now ask:

What does Chili's offer me for the same money?

That is the competitive disruption.

Chili's executives have already indicated that the company intends to make comparisons visible by showing consumers the difference in portion size, ingredients and experience.

And that is exactly how category boundaries begin to disappear.

The Bigger Opportunity Is the Occasion

The restaurant industry should stop asking:

“Who is our competitor?”

It should start asking:

“What other food occasions can steal our customer's dollar?”

That is a much larger question.

A burger chain isn't only competing against burger chains.

A Mexican QSR isn't only competing against Mexican QSRs.

A casual-dining restaurant isn't only competing against casual dining.

They are all competing for share of stomach, share of wallet and share of occasion.

Brinker executives made essentially this point at Investor Day, noting that Chili's can source guests from across the restaurant landscape rather than from one specific category.

That is the future of foodservice marketing.

The Grocerant Guru® Perspective

I have long argued that there are no silos in the consumer's mind.

Consumers don't care whether the food industry calls something QSR, fast casual, casual dining, convenience retail, grocery prepared foods or a restaurant.

They care about what's for dinner.

They care about what's for lunch.

They care about how much it costs.

They care about how much food they receive.

They care about quality.

They care about speed.

They care about service.

And increasingly, they care about whether the experience is worth leaving home for.

Chili's is demonstrating what happens when a restaurant stops defining its competition by industry classification and starts defining competition by consumer value perception.

The next phase may be Mexican QSR.

But the larger opportunity is much bigger.

It is the consumer.

And the consumer has never recognized the silos in the first place.

Three Insights from the Grocerant Guru®

1. Stop defining competition by category.

The restaurant industry needs to stop asking, “Who operates in our category?” and start asking, “Who is competing for this consumer's next meal?” That includes restaurants, grocery prepared foods, convenience stores, delivery, takeout and increasingly every retailer capable of selling Ready-2-Eat or Heat-N-Eat food.

2. Price gets attention—but value wins the occasion.

Chili's lesson is not simply that $10.99 is powerful. The lesson is that what the consumer receives for $10.99 creates the value proposition. Food quantity, food quality, service, atmosphere, convenience and price must work together. That is the Price Value Service Equilibrium.

3. The future belongs to Mix-and-Match.

Chili's potential move into Mexican QSR demonstrates the power of using existing foodservice components in new ways. Chicken Crispers can become tacos. Fajita steak can become quesadillas. Sauces can create new flavor platforms. Existing ingredients can create new occasions.

That's Mix-and-Match Meal Component Bundling—and it is one of the most powerful ways to grow food sales without rebuilding the entire business from scratch.

The biggest lesson from Chili's isn't that casual dining is going after Mexican QSR.

The biggest lesson is that the consumer has already eliminated the silos. The smartest food marketers are simply catching up.

Tap into the Foodservice Solutions® team for greater understanding of New Electricity or for a Grocerant Program Assessment, Grocerant ScoreCard, or for product positioning or placement assistance, or call our Grocerant Guru®.  Since 1991 www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche. Contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or 253-759-7869

 

Why the Time Is Now — And Why the Concept Is Consumer Driven

 

Let me give credit where credit is due: Danielle Romano and Convenience Store News provide the foundation for this discussion with their excellent look at the return of Swiss Farms and its plan to evolve America's drive-thru grocer.

But from the perspective of Steven Johnson, the Grocerant Guru®, at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® the bigger story is not simply that Swiss Farms is coming back.

The bigger story is why the timing makes sense now.

Swiss Farms is showing what happens when a retail food concept starts with a consumer behavior and then builds the business around it.

That distinction matters.

Too many retailers begin with a facility, a menu, a format, a technology platform or an internal operating model and then ask consumers to adapt.

The Grocerant Niche works in the opposite direction.

Start with the consumer. Identify the friction. Solve the food occasion. Then build the format around the solution.

That is exactly what makes Swiss Farms interesting.

The Consumer Is Already Telling Us What Comes Next

For nearly six decades, Swiss Farms has built its identity around a simple proposition: consumers can get food and everyday essentials without leaving the vehicle. The company's current strategy keeps that drive-thru DNA while expanding fresh food, made-to-order food and beverages, grocery essentials, loyalty and eventually fuel.

That is not a random assortment of new ideas.

It reflects a consumer reality that has been accelerating across restaurants, grocery stores and convenience stores:

Consumers increasingly want the food they want, when they want it, in the easiest format available.

The National Restaurant Association's 2025 Off-Premises Restaurant Trends found that 47% of adults pick up takeout at least weekly and 42% use the drive-thru weekly. The same research identifies speed, customer service, technology, value and loyalty as basic requirements for repeat off-premises business.

That is important because it changes the competitive set.

Swiss Farms is not simply competing with another grocery store.

It is competing for the consumer's time.

And time may be one of the most valuable commodities in the modern food marketplace.

The Opportunity Is Not "More Food." It Is Less Friction.

Swiss Farms' leadership describes the problem with remarkable clarity.

Traditional grocery shopping can require parking, unloading children, walking through a large store and spending substantial time shopping for only a few products. Swiss Farms' answer is essentially: pull up, provide the list and open the trunk.

That is a Grocerant proposition.

The consumer isn't necessarily saying:

"I want another grocery store."

The consumer is saying:

"I need milk, breakfast, coffee, dinner, snacks and maybe gas — and I don't want to spend an hour accomplishing it."

That is a very different business proposition.

The National Restaurant Association's 2025 research reinforces the point. Consumers increasingly judge off-premises experiences on speed, value and ease, while younger adults report using takeout, drive-thru and delivery more often than the previous year.

The winning question is therefore not:

How do we get consumers to spend more time with us?

It is:

How do we give consumers more value for the time they give us?

Why the Time Is Now

The economic environment makes this even more relevant.

The National Restaurant Association reported in June 2026 that 36% of consumers said they were spending less at restaurants than the previous quarter, while more consumers were trading down, ordering fewer add-ons and choosing less expensive options.

At the same time, the Association reported in August 2026 that consumers continue to value convenience while household budgets remain under pressure.

This creates a fascinating intersection.

Consumers still want foodservice.

They still want fresh food.

They still want convenience.

But they are becoming increasingly deliberate about where their dollars go.

That is the environment in which hybrid concepts become especially interesting.

A consumer may not view a Swiss Farms purchase as "grocery" or "restaurant" or "convenience."

They simply see dinner.

They see breakfast.

They see something to eat now.

They see something to take home for later.

The consumer does not live inside industry silos.

Why should the operator?

Retail Foodservice Is Already Breaking Down the Silos

FMI's 2025 research found that consumers are increasingly treating grocery foodservice as an alternative to restaurant dining. The share of consumers choosing deli-prepared foods instead of restaurant meals more than doubled from 12% in 2017 to 28% in 2025. More than half of Americans now take a hybrid approach to meals, combining prepared foods with items from their own kitchens.

Read that again.

Hybrid is becoming normal.

That is the Grocerant Niche in action.

The meal doesn't have to come from one place.

Consumers can buy a prepared entrée, add a side from home, purchase a beverage at a convenience store and finish the meal with something already in the pantry.

The consumer creates the meal.

The retailer's job is to make that creation easier.

That is why Swiss Farms' plan for a curated grocery assortment is so intriguing. Instead of trying to reproduce a supermarket's thousands of SKUs, the strategy calls for carrying the top products in major grocery categories.

That is not about offering everything.

It is about offering enough of the right things.

The Consumer-Driven Concept Is Mix-and-Match

This is where the Grocerant Niche becomes particularly powerful.

I have long argued that consumers are increasingly comfortable with Mix-and-Match Meal Component Bundling.

The consumer does not necessarily want a conventional restaurant meal.

The consumer may want:

A breakfast sandwich and coffee now.

A take-home dinner later.

A Stromboli for one family member.

A milkshake for another.

Fresh groceries for tomorrow.

Snacks for the car.

Fuel while already making the trip.

Swiss Farms' evolving model touches each of those occasions. Its planned foodservice program includes breakfast sandwiches, coffee, Stromboli, refreshers, milkshakes and take-home meal options, while its broader strategy adds grocery essentials and fuel at new locations.

That is not simply an expanded convenience store.

It is a consumer-controlled meal ecosystem.

Convenience Is No Longer Enough

There is an important warning here.

Convenience by itself is becoming table stakes.

Consumers also want value, quality, freshness, variety and personalization.

Technomic's 2026 retail foodservice research identifies evolving expectations around value, quality and freshness, while also highlighting interest in made-to-order food, grab-and-go options, customization, breakfast sandwiches and other cross-category foodservice offerings.

That fits Swiss Farms' strategy surprisingly well.

The concept is not saying:

"We are fast, therefore we win."

It is saying:

"We are fast, while becoming more relevant."

That is a much stronger proposition.

Consumer Choice Is Becoming the Format

Swiss Farms plans to preserve its drive-thru while also adding a walk-in option at new locations.

That may be one of the most important details in the entire story.

Why?

Because the company is not forcing every consumer into one behavior.

The consumer who wants speed can use the drive-thru.

The consumer who wants to browse can walk inside.

The consumer who wants digital engagement can use the app and loyalty program.

The consumer who wants nostalgia can engage with the brand through merchandise and familiar visual cues.

That is consumer-driven retail.

The brand is adapting to the consumer rather than demanding that the consumer adapt to the brand.

And that distinction is increasingly important.

Why Restaurants Should Pay Attention

Restaurants should pay attention because Swiss Farms represents something larger than one company's growth strategy.

The competitive battlefield is increasingly moving from restaurant versus restaurant to food occasion versus food occasion.

FMI reported in 2024 that 29% of consumers said they were pulling back from restaurants and turning to grocery stores for convenient meal solutions, with prepared foods becoming increasingly relevant across breakfast, lunch and dinner.

That means a restaurant dinner can lose the occasion before a consumer ever thinks about visiting another restaurant.

The replacement might be:

A grocery deli meal.

A convenience-store dinner.

A drive-thru purchase.

A meal kit.

A prepared entrée.

A combination of several retailers.

Or some combination of all of them.

The consumer doesn't care which industry classification wins.

The consumer cares which solution wins.

And This Is Where "What's for Dinner?" Becomes a Retail Strategy

The fundamental food question remains remarkably simple:

What's for dinner?

The answer is increasingly not determined by a restaurant menu or a grocery shopping list.

It is determined by time, money, convenience, appetite, household needs and what the consumer wants to do next.

FMI's 2026 grocery research reports that shoppers are looking for help making lunch and dinner easier without sacrificing health or value. Better-value lunch options lead their requests, followed by healthier, fresher, more varied and better-tasting prepared foods.

That is exactly the consumer-driven opportunity.

Consumers don't necessarily want somebody to tell them what dinner is.

They want somebody to make their version of dinner easier.

Why Swiss Farms Matters to the Grocerant Niche

Swiss Farms is particularly interesting because it is retaining the thing that consumers already understand while adding the things consumers increasingly want.

Keep the drive-thru.

Add fresh food.

Add grocery essentials.

Add made-to-order.

Add take-home meals.

Add technology.

Add loyalty.

Add new formats.

Add fuel where appropriate.

But keep the consumer at the center.

That is the formula.

Not technology for technology's sake.

Not more SKUs simply to say you have more SKUs.

Not a restaurant bolted onto a convenience store.

Not a grocery store trying to become a restaurant.

Rather:

A consumer-driven food solution that crosses categories because consumers already cross categories.

And that may be the most important lesson of all.

The Grocerant Niche has never been about whether a product is sold by a restaurant, grocery store, convenience store, dollar store, warehouse club or another retailer.

It is about the consumer's decision to buy Ready-2-Eat or Heat-N-Eat food where it is easiest, most relevant and most valuable at that moment.

Swiss Farms is betting that the time is right.

The consumer data suggests the market conditions are moving in that direction.

The next question is whether more operators will recognize that the future of food retail is not being designed in conference rooms.

It is being designed one consumer occasion at a time.

Three Insights from the Grocerant Guru®

1. The time is now because consumers are already breaking the silos.
Restaurant, grocery, convenience and foodservice are increasingly interchangeable in the consumer's mind. The industry may still use separate boxes, but consumers increasingly do not. FMI's prepared-food data makes that migration measurable.

2. Consumer-driven concepts solve friction before they add complexity.
Swiss Farms starts with a very simple consumer proposition — get essentials quickly — then adds foodservice, grocery, technology, loyalty and fuel around it.

3. The next generation of Grocerant growth will be built around "one now, one later."
The strongest concepts will increasingly satisfy the immediate need while creating the next meal occasion. Breakfast now. Dinner later. Coffee now. Groceries later. Snack now. Take-home meal later. That is not simply convenience. That is consumer-centric food occasion management — and it is where the next wave of Grocerant growth can emerge.

Tap into the Foodservice Solutions® team for greater understanding of New Electricity or for a Grocerant Program Assessment, Grocerant ScoreCard, or for product positioning or placement assistance, or call our Grocerant Guru®.  Since 1991 www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche. Contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or 253-759-7869