Never on Sunday: Where Do Chick-fil-A Fans Flock When Chain Isn’t Open?

Hungry Chick-fil-A customers have to search for somewhere else to eat on Sundays, when the growing fast-food chain is closed for business. Where they go varies by where they live, and the findings could hold lessons for other restaurants scouting locations.

Full-service restaurants including Cracker Barrel, Denny’s and IHOP are among Chick-fil-A fan favorites for a Sunday meal in some of the nation’s largest states, according to data provider Buxton. Meanwhile, fast-food chains including Whataburger, Culver’s and McDonald’s cornered the market in other states.

The results help answer a question that “has perplexed retail property owners and developers seeking to counter the drop-off in traffic caused by shuttered restaurants,” according to a recent Buxton blog post.

Chick-fil-A has kept its doors closed on Sundays since the Atlanta-based company's founding in 1946, when late founder S. Truett Cathy, a devout Southern Baptist, aimed to honor the day’s religious significance in the Christian faith as a time for rest and reflection.

It remains the only major chain to take that day off, even while growing to become the nation’s third-largest restaurant chain based on 2018 systemwide sales – behind only McDonald’s and Starbucks. Chick-fil-A racked up $10.5 billion at more than 2,300 locations last year, up 16.7% from the prior year, according to Nation’s Restaurant News.

Using global positioning pings from mobile devices of the chain’s regular customers over two years, Buxton found foot-traffic winners on Sundays were mostly full-service casual eateries rather than fast-food competitors.

In its home base of Tennessee and 18 other Eastern and Southeastern states, Cracker Barrel was the top Sunday choice of regular Chick-fil-A customers. The country-style family restaurant, with $3 billion in 2018 sales at 660 locations, was also the No. 2 choice in another six states and placed third in four others.

Other gainers were chains that are well established in the breakfast arena. Denny’s was the top choice in California and Nevada while landing in the top three in seven other states, and IHOP took the top spot in Arizona and five other states. Waffle House made the list in 10 states, though it had no first-place finishes.

In some states, the winners were regional favorites. Burger chain Whataburger in Texas, fast food and ice cream chain Culver’s in Wisconsin and Iowa, pancake and steakhouse chain Elmer’s in Oregon. Stalwart McDonald’s corralled most of the Sunday Chick-fil-A crowd in Utah and Minnesota, while Pizza Hut took the top spot in Massachusetts.

Other analysts, who were not involved in the Buxton study, noted some of the results make sense for a Sunday. Restaurants like Denny’s and IHOP tend to do better on weekends, when people have time to linger on meals, while fast-food chains including Chick-fil-A do their peak business during the week.

“During the week when time pressures exist for many Americans, consumers will choose fast food for breakfast and lunch frequently,” said Darren Tristano, chief executive of consulting firm FoodserviceResults in Chicago. “On the weekend, consumers like to relax, take more time and patronize full-service restaurants where they can enjoy greater options and a more relaxed experience.”

Chick-fil-A, which is not a Buxton client and did not participate in the study, did not respond to a request for comment on the findings. Buxton has a business relationship with CoStar.

Shared Customer Base

Chick-fil-A's growth prompted Buxton to measure where those chicken aficionados were heading on Sundays if they weren’t eating at home. The consulting firm used internal technologies to examine global positioning system data, monitoring pings from phones and other mobile devices in Chick-Fil-A outlets to see where those same devices showed up on Sundays over a two-year period. The team excluded coffee and donut shops and did not count eateries 100 miles or more from a Chick-fil-A as part of its process.

“We were specifically looking at where people who normally go to that restaurant were going when that restaurant was closed,” Phillip Crow, senior vice president of product development, told CoStar News, adding this was intended as a tech-oriented case study and not a deeper scientific study of consumer habits. “The technology is making it possible to dig down to a very granular level.”

Other industry analysts told CoStar News that generally speaking the results can be explained partly by several commonalities that the beneficiary restaurants have with Chick-fil-A, including pricing, demographics and geographic-centric preferences.

Tristano said that on Sunday in particular, consumers would be more likely to choose a full-service restaurant for breakfast, lunch or brunch, for occasions including time with family, pre-or post-church meals, shopping or movie visits. Chains like Cracker Barrel, IHOP, Denny’s and Waffle House are grouped by the restaurant industry in the family-style segment, with per-person meal tabs in the $9 to $13 range, just above Chick-fil-A’s check average, he said.

Jerry Prendergast, principal in restaurant consulting firm Prendergast & Associates in Los Angeles, said findings like those in the Buxton study might prove useful in gauging the impact of Chick-fil-A on other adjacent businesses in a neighborhood, but cautioned against generalizing the results nationally to reflect consumer behavior beyond a small radius of any given location of the chicken chain.

Prendergast said he took an informal poll of his own contacts who own Denny’s and IHOP locations, who told him they could not identify business bumps specifically tied to Chick-fil-A being closed. He said an exact comparison or connection may not be possible because of the differing business models.

“Generally, people not going to eat at one style of restaurant service is not going to impact another style of service,” Prendergast said.

Still, Buxton officials said the Chick-fil-A study points to a larger issue that many companies scouting locations will need to weigh: whether an otherwise popular tenant in a retail center might impact their own business negatively or reduce revenue expectations because its foot-traffic doesn’t span seven days.

The Buxton results could prove useful for retail store and restaurant operators to find out how their own customer base overlaps with those of other popular national chains with a proven track record, according to Todd Walls, Buxton’s chief innovation officer.

“In the retail store category, a good example would be Hobby Lobby,” said Buxton’s Crow, referring to the arts and crafts retailer which also does not operate on Sundays for similar religious reasons.

That’s a question that may take on increased relevance as Chick-fil-A expands. The closely held chain has seven U.S. openings in seven states planned just between Aug. 29 and Sept. 19 after opening six restaurants earlier this year, according to its website, and it plans to soon debut the first of 15 locations planned for the Toronto market.