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Limited-service Mexican restaurants Taco Bell and Qdoba are ramping up their presence across the U.S., bringing thousands of new stores slinging tacos and burritos to new markets.
Qdoba, the third-largest Mexican quick-service chain in the U.S. after Taco Bell and Chipotle, plans to double its store count in the next decade from 750 to 1,500, it announced Wednesday.
It plans to open 40 new restaurants this year alone and another 60 next year. Starting in 2025, it expects to open more than 80 each year to get to its goal of doubling by 2033, it said in its release. Its 750 restaurants, 80% franchised, are spread across 45 states.
"We are in the process of aggressively accelerating new restaurant development in partnership with existing and new franchisees,” John Cywinski, the CEO of Qdoba's parent company, Modern Restaurant Concepts, said in a statement. “Once our pipeline is fully established, we expect to sustain a 10% annual growth rate through new restaurant development.”
Meanwhile, Taco Bell has set its sights on new restaurants, announcing it now plans to operate 10,000 U.S. locations in the next few years, up from its current count of more than 7,200, according to its website. It is also focused on “digitally enabled restaurants” as a key part of the rollout.
Its new Go Mobile cooperation, which started with a location in El Paso, Texas, in March, is now operating in Columbus, Georgia. The small-box design has ramped up technology offerings to allow people to shop and pick up online, a response to what Taco Bell describes as an industrywide problem of drive-thru bottlenecks.
The push reflects demand shifts among fast-food customers, who are increasingly consuming food via drive-thru and mobile delivery and pickup orders rather than dining in, The Wall Street Journal reported.
In June, Chipotle Mexican Grill announced plans to open up to 800 new locations in small towns over the next few years. Fast-casual Mediterranean restaurant chain Cava filed an initial public offering in May amid plans to nearly quadruple its locations to 1,000 within the next decade.
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