Following a spate of closures and a frosty second-quarter sales performance, Wendy's has lost its status as the nation’s second-largest burger chain.
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The fast-food chain has shuttered a net 245 restaurants so far this year, CoStar News reported, and CEO Bob Wright said during its Q2 earnings call Friday that Wendy's portfolio will continue to shrink.
Wright, whom Wendy's named as its new president and CEO in May, added that the upcoming closures will be more targeted.
“What you heard in some previous quarters was closures addressed more as a program for the system,” Wright said.
“We are going to come alongside our franchisees if they need our help, if we need to use closures of a few restaurants here and there to make a portfolio a little bit healthier and help that franchisee get to the right place,” he added. “Maybe a trade area has moved on and it's no longer a business that's viable going forward.”
The update came after Wendy’s sales fell 6.5% worldwide quarter-over-quarter, due largely to an 8.2% drop in the U.S. This was the chain’s sixth straight quarter of contraction on that front.
Following years of Wendy’s closures, Burger King has supplanted Wendy's as the nation’s second-largest burger chain, CNBC reported.
Burger King sales jumped 8.5% last quarter, but it remains in a distant second compared to McDonald’s, which held nearly half of the U.S. burger market in 2024.
Wendy’s overtook Burger King in 2020 and held on to the No. 2 spot for six years.
Wendy’s announced plans to shrink its footprint by roughly 6% in February, following an 11.3% sales drop in the fourth quarter.
The chain is doing better outside the U.S., with international sales up 3.4% last quarter.
Wendy’s opened its first Ireland location at a shopping mall in Cork last year via a partnership with Corrib Oil, which planned to open 10 more across the country by the end of 2027.
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