Data Center

Chicken remains the fastest-growing major restaurant category, but the era of automatic double-digit growth ended. The 2025 category figure of +5.3% compares with +3% for the total industry.

Chick-fil-A generates roughly eight times the unit volume of Church's Texas Chicken. AUV is the single most important input into what rent a site can carry. Dave's Hot Chicken's figure is franchisee-reported rather than franchisor-disclosed.

Krispy Krunchy Chicken has more points of distribution than any traditional chicken chain in America — and occupies almost no restaurant real estate, because it lives inside convenience stores. The Popeyes figure covers the U.S. and Canada combined.

Two brands are growing units faster than 50% a year. One major brand is shrinking. Where marked, growth is derived arithmetically from sourced start- and end-of-period unit counts.

The two largest publicly reported chicken systems are both in negative comp territory. KFC's turnaround is the only positive inflection among the legacy brands.

The 100 basis point spread between corporate and franchisee QSR credit is the price the market puts on knowing who actually operates the restaurant.

Wings ended 2025 at roughly half their end-2024 price, and boneless skinless breast fell from a mid-year peak of $2.77 to $1.16. Cheap inputs are currently offsetting weak traffic across the wing category.

161 closures against 15 openings in calendar 2025, then 46 more closures in the first quarter of 2026. Every one of those closures is a second-generation chicken box.

Chicken is the most consumed animal protein in the United States and per-capita availability is still setting records. Weak brand comps are a share problem, not a demand problem.