Starting out as a single restaurant in Columbus, Ohio, in 1969 when fast food was still a novelty on the American food scene, Wendy’s grew into one of the largest restaurant chains in the U.S. Throughout its history, and into the present, Wendy’s has positioned itself as a tried-and-true hamburger-and-fries-focused restaurant, but to compete with its more dominant sector-mates like McDonald’s and Burger King, it’s always done things a little bit differently. Its burger patties are square, it famously serves a melty, malty concoction called the Frosty instead of a milkshake, and the menu offers unique and even healthy fare like chili and baked potatoes as well as fat-laden monster sandwiches like the Baconator.
Forever an underdog because it’s been unable to reach the breadth or income level of McDonald’s, Wendy’s has shown signs of struggle in recent years. Will the chain created and curated by founder and spokesperson Dave Thomas so long ago get swallowed up by the fast food industry it helped normalize? It very well could. Here are all the things that could point to Wendy’s not being around forever.
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The world’s first Wendy’s location is sadly no more, and so are a lot more Wendy’s stores as of late. While there are well over 6,000 Wendy’s locations open for business in the U.S. in 2024, only a few hundred of those are company-owned. And in a sign that the business might be suffering some problems, Wendy’s announced plans to close down more than 100 of its outlets in 2024. In the first three months of the year, it already shut down shops at a rate of one every three days.
The decision to abruptly close down such a substantial portion of its portfolio came on the heels of Wendy’s changing its mind about the future. In 2023, it walked back an aggressive plan to move more into food delivery. Some locales are now unable to secure their Wendy’s food in any way, which means things don’t necessarily bode well for Wendy’s even as it recalibrates and sets off on a plan to open new restaurants while simultaneously closing others (it’s one of the many fast food restaurants shutting down stores in 2024).
There’s a lot of money to be made in the fast food breakfast sector — McDonald’s dominates it with more than $2 billion in annual sales of its Egg McMuffin and other morning offerings. McDonald’s also pioneered a.m. fast food in the 1970s, and it’s been difficult for its competitors to cut into its business, particularly Wendy’s. The smaller burger chain has tried several times to launch a nationwide breakfast menu, and each time in the past, they’ve failed. Attempts in 1985, 2007, and 2012 all proved unpopular with customers and thus unprofitable. Wendy’s new breakfast menu finally debuted in 2020, and although it’s lasted for a company-record four years, the $20 million, heavily-advertised gamble hasn’t fully paid off yet.
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