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Earlier in the year, John Cywinski, a former Applebee's brand president who took the reins of Modern Restaurant Concepts in January 2023—a group that included QDOBA, Modern Market Eatery, and Lemonade at the time (Lemonade has since closed shop and Modern Market was sold to Thrive Restaurant Group)—called the Mexican fast casual a "diamond in the rough." Namely, he felt the brand sat squarely between two mature, legacy battles in QSR: pizza and chicken. Mexican fast casual, however, remains a "sweet spot" amid a crowded landscape and a subcategory with plenty of whitespace.
Outside of Chipotle and its 3,934 year-end 2025 restaurants, QDOBA closed the calendar with 827 units and Moe's Southwest Grill had 568 (the GoTo Foods brand had 722 in 2019). Del Taco, a closer comparison to Taco Bell than, say, an assembly line fast casual, had 576 as 2026 arrived. And regarding the Yum! Brands giant, it dotted 7,784 stores across America. There's a reason Taco Bell often describes itself as a "category of one" at scale.
QDOBA, founded in 1995 as "Zuma Fresh Mexican Grill," changing its name two years later to Z-TECA before becoming QDOBA Mexican Grill in 1999, hit 200 locations within a decade. Then, it took another six years to reach 600. It became QDOBA Mexican Eats in 2015 and was sold to Duckhorn-backer Butterfly Equity in 2022. Butterfly raised $527 million three years later, led by Apollo Global Management's Sponsor and Secondary Solutions business. That continuation fund gave early investors a chance to cash out and also set QDOBA up with more money to keep growing.
Apollo previously owned QDOBA before selling it to Butterfly. Jack in the Box directed QDOBA from 2003 to 2018 and dealt it to the firm for $305 million. The burger brand took on QDOBA for $45 million when it had 85 restaurants. Apollo owned QDOBA for four calendars before Butterfly swooped in.
The L.A-based firm, which had an inaugural $305 million securitization effort in 2023 for QDOBA before a recent $435 million one, hired a new executive team (including Cywinski), shifted to a franchise-first model, turned toward new unit development, and positioned QDOBA as an asset-light, high-growth operator.
Store No. 800 arrived this year.
Cywinski, speaking at the ICR Conference, said "many, many more" QDOBAs were coming. He outlined a 10-year path to 2,000 restaurants, $2.7 million average-unit volumes, $5 billion in systemwide sales, a 28 percent store-level EBITDA margin, and a $200 million national marketing fund.
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