Chili's facts for kids

Quick facts for kids
Chili's Grill & Bar

Logo used since September 2011.
Chili's location in Pooler, Georgia
Type	Subsidiary
Industry	Restaurant
Genre	Casual dining
Founded	March 13, 1975; 50 years ago (1975-03-13)
Founder	Larry Lavine
Headquarters	3000 Olympus Blvd Coppell, Texas 75019 US
Number of locations	1,610 (2020)
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Kevin Hochman (CEO)
Products	American cuisine
Parent	Brinker International

Chili's Grill & Bar is an American casual dining restaurant chain. The company was founded by Larry Lavine in Texas in 1975 and is currently owned and operated by Brinker International.

History

Chili's first location, a converted postal station on Greenville Avenue in the Vickery Meadows area of Dallas, Texas, opened in 1975. The original Chili's on Greenville Avenue moved to a new building on the same site in 1981; it relocated again in 2007.

Lavine's concept was to create an informal, full-service dining restaurant with a menu featuring different types of hamburgers offered at an affordable price. The brand grew larger, and by the early 1980s, there were 28 Chili's locations in the region, all featuring similar Southwest decor.

In 1983, Lavine sold the company to restaurant executive Norman E. Brinker, formerly of the Pillsbury restaurant group that owned Bennigan's.

Menu

Chili's serves American food, Tex-Mex cuisine and dishes influenced by Mexican cuisine, such as shrimp tacos, quesadillas, and fajitas.

In addition to their regular menu, the company offers a nutritional menu, allergen menu, and vegetarian menu.

Advertising

"Chili's (Welcome to Chili's!)" is an advertising jingle used in Chili's Restaurant commercials to advertise the restaurant's line of baby back ribs. The song was written by Guy Bommarito and produced by Tom Faulkner Productions for GSD&M Advertising of Austin, Texas. Faulkner sings both "I want my baby back, baby back, baby back..." (Which is similar to the Tommy James song "Draggin' the Line"), as well as the melodic theme. The deep "Bar-B-Q sauce" line was sung by famed New York bass vocalist Willie McCoy. A 1996 rendition of the jingle features a doo-wop quartet, Take 6, singing a cappella. Advertising Age magazine named the song first on its list of "10 songs most likely to get stuck in your head" in 2004. In October 2017, the jingle was revived to advertise Chili's new menu, where it was re-conceptualized as "Oh Baby, Chili's is Back (Baby, Back, Baby, Back)".

In 2008, the chain aired parody ads for "P. J. Bland's", a fictional restaurant chain with cardboard foods.

In 2012, Chili's used Wendy Rene's Stax single, "Bar-B-Q", in their TV commercial.

In September 2017, Chili's dropped about 40 percent of its menu items to focus on burgers, ribs, and fajitas.

In February 2020, Chili's announced a new marketing campaign encouraging people to "laugh so hard you pee a little." The new campaign was focused on "Out to 'Ita" and used elements of ASMR.

Locations

As of 2015, they have 1,580 locations worldwide, including 839 that are company-owned and 741 that are franchised.

Legal problems

In October 2008, a Chili's Australia franchise was prosecuted and fined A$300,000 by the NSW Office of Industrial Relations for underpaying staff, pressuring employees to sign an Australian workplace agreement, and failing to pay A$45,000 in owed wages by a deadline set by the Office of Industrial Relations. In the same year, Chili's announced the permanent closure of all its Australian locations due to poor sales, unprofitability, and non-compliance with the Fair Work Act 2009.

See also

In Spanish: Chili's para niños