Chili’s has made a major change to its most popular burger, yet customers and their own executives could not pinpoint exactly what was different.
CEO Kevin Hochman confessed that the restaurant chain made a major alteration to their best-selling cheeseburger, The OldTimer, that’s saving them a fortune.
‘One of the executives was like, “Oh, the burger is different.” Another was like, “Oh, the cheese is different.” Another one’s like, “The buns are toasted differently.” We all got it wrong,’ he told the Wall Street Journal.
Little did they know, the money-saving trick was actually the pickles.
Hochman revealed the company’s kitchen staff were fed up with the five-gallon pickle jugs that resembled ‘painter’s jugs’ which required a special tool to pry open.
He referred to the process as ‘liberating the pickles.’
‘It was like a 5-gallon jug that looked like a painter’s jug and it had a special tool to pry open the pickles.’
Instead, the company swapped the type of pickle they used – opting for a jar that had a twist top that saved employees time and hassle.
The simple pickle swap ended up saving the company millions.
‘They said, ‘Oh by the way, this is over half a million dollars cheaper than the liberated pickles,” he said.
The pickle swap is just one of many cost-cutting measures Chili’s has implemented as part of a strategy that appears to be working effectively for the chain.
It comes as Chili’s pulled off a remarkable comeback, which experts are hailing as the ‘best one of all time.’
The 49-year-old casual dining restaurant, which is known for its baby back ribs and Tex Mex menu, has seen a surge in customers in the last year.
As other restaurant chains are filing for bankruptcy and struggling to get people through the door, foot traffic to Chili’s increased 20 percent in the last quarter.
Sales at restaurants that have been open for at least a year increased a huge 31 percent last quarter, which was its third consecutive quarter of double-digit growth.
These stunning results drove parent company Brinker International’s stock up 16 percent on Wednesday to a record high.
Analysts said the company’s turnaround was ‘the best one of all time’ for the restaurant industry, while another said Hochman was ‘going to write a great book on this some day,’ CNN reported.
So how has this once-forgotten chain managed to pull this off?
Chili’s updated its menu, and leant heavily into social media, managing to build up a new younger audience.
‘Chili’s has been on fire lately and has been significantly boosting traffic to its restaurants,’ Neil Saunders, head of retail at GlobalData, told DailyMail.com in February.
‘There are a whole host of reasons for the success including improved menus and product quality, strong social media activity, and winning over younger diners.’
Chili’s is also helped by the fact it is good value for money, so it’s an affordable indulgence for many Americans who are still feeling pinched by inflation, he said.
Hochman, who took over the top role in 2022, simplified the Chili’s menu and upgraded its French fry and chicken tender – or chicken ‘crisper’ – recipes.
Brinker International spent more than $400 million on the new menu, plus adding more servers and upgrading outdated restaurants.
Now, the menu focuses on four core offerings: burgers, chicken crispers, fajitas and margaritas.