America's Most Popular Casual Dining Chain Was Just Dethroned By Texas Roadhouse

After topping the restaurant charts for seven years, Olive Garden is now playing second fiddle to America's newest most popular casual dining chain: Texas Roadhouse. Based on annual sales, more folks in the U.S. opted for that chain's American-style cuisine over Italian fare in 2024, with the steakhouse increasing sales from the previous year by 14.7%. Although Olive Garden is still the second most popular chain, bringing in $5.2 billion in 2024, its growth stalled and it only expanded sales by 0.8%.

It wasn't for lack of trying. Olive Garden brought back its incredibly popular never-ending pasta bowl to entice customers to stop in, and it also worked with Uber to offer delivery options for folks living within delivery distance from its establishments. Still, it wasn't enough to keep people away from Texas Roadhouse's hand-cut steaks and hospitable environment that helps elevate the taste of the food. Some other casual dining restaurants had strong growth in 2024 as well, which is somewhat surprising given that the year overall was not kind to the food service industry.

While Texas Roadhouse dominated in 2024, several other well-known restaurants filed for bankruptcy. Some companies that didn't have to take that extreme measure, like Outback Steakhouse, still saw sales slump. Aside from Texas Roadhouse, there was one other outlier that had a significant increase in sales: Chili's. By putting in a concerted effort to appeal to hungry diners on social media, it was able to claim the number three spot on the list in front of Applebee's and Buffalo Wild Wings. One can only imagine what sales could have been for the casual Tex-Mex haunt if it brought back its popular discontinued Chicken Crispers.

With many folks recently tightening their budgets regarding restaurant dining, it is quite a feat for Texas Roadhouse to see so much growth. Still, after being the top dog in casual dining for seven years, Olive Garden won't be sitting idly by in the shadow of the steakhouse. It would be safe to expect the restaurant to make some advertising waves this year. Be it through marketing or offering customers never-before-seen specials, the casual dining chain will certainly be attempting to get more customers coming in the door.