Popeyes wants to expand and expedite their drive-thrus.
With the release of their fan-favorite chicken sandwich in 2019, fast food chain Popeyes became an overnight power-player in the fast food scene, prompting nearly every other chain on the market to try and duplicate their success. However, while the chicken sandwich brought in large swaths of customers to Popeyes locations, it also highlighted a problem: most Popeyes locations aren’t equipped to handle large influxes of business at once.
In order to address this concern, Popeyes’ parent company, Restaurant Brands International, is looking to begin expanding their existing locations with more spacious, speed-focused drive-thrus to more quickly process customer orders.
“The development team continues to take a proactive approach to franchisee format and site selection to … make Popeyes more convenient for guests,” RBI CEO Jose Cil said in an analyst call.
“In North America, most openings in 2022 have been freestanding, single, or double drive-thru locations that not only offer more convenience for guests, but also typically deliver results ahead of the system average,” he added.
“Making Popeyes more convenient to guests goes beyond development opportunities,” Cil said. “We also need to ensure we’re providing guests with a consistent experience across a diversified set of ordering modes and platforms.”
Now, Popeyes is focusing on something else: Speed and convenience. And that means more drive-thrus. https://t.co/W6m0twxOlU
— CNN (@CNN) November 4, 2022
Besides enhancing their existing locations, RBI is hoping to open at least 200 more Popeyes locations around North America in the near future. Presumably, these new locations will adopt this new drive-thru paradigm from the beginning.