Chipotle's negative same-store sales streak continues

Yahoo

6 days ago

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Dive Brief:
Chipotle's same-store sales declined about 4% during Q2 2025, continuing a trend of negative growth that began in Q1, the company said in a Wednesday earnings report.
The decrease was driven by a 4.9% drop in transactions, partially offset by a 0.9% increase in average check.
While Q2 marks one of the brand's worst quarters for comparable sales growth since 2020, Chipotle expects flat comparable sales for the year, according to the report. Ongoing volatility with sales related to consumer spending led the chain to that projection, CFO Adam Rymer said on a Wednesday earnings call.
Dive Insight:
Despite a slowdown in May, sales momentum grew in June, Boatwright said during the earnings call, thanks to enhanced marketing initiatives and menu innovation.
'Exiting the quarter, we returned to a positive comp and transaction trends, which have continued into July,' he said, adding that consumer confidence also appeared to improve in June and July.
During the second quarter, Chipotle's total traffic was up 0.7%, compared to a 0.5% increase in fast casual segment traffic, according to Placer.ai data. While traffic chainwide was up at Chipotle, visits per location fell 6%, according to Placer.ai, which uses tens of millions of devices and machine learning to estimate visits to locations in the U.S. Comparatively, traffic was flat per location in the fast casual segment. Placer.ai's measurements often yield slightly different, but still useful, results from company earnings reports.
'Some of the dip is likely due to lapping the successful Chicken al Pastor launch and to the Easter calendar shift, which made for a difficult comparison,' Placer.ai said. 'But the dip had narrowed to just -1.5% by June 2025, suggesting that the chain may be seeing the impacts of its latest menu additions.'
Comparable sales fell during the first half of 2025.
In mid-March, the company launched Chipotle Honey Chicken, which was the highest performing LTO in the company's history, and consumers included the protein in about a quarter of all orders. The company plans to expand its LTO cadence from two annually to three, Boatwright said.
'The guest feedback has been very positive,' Boatwright said. 'It will certainly be another LTO that we will bring back in the future.'
The company also added its first dip in five years, Adobo Ranch, which is driving incremental transactions, Boatwright said, adding that the chain sees more opportunity to add sides and dips in the future, and already has a side that could launch in the fall.
Chipotle has been boosting marketing, with the goal of doubling its reach on social media and streaming, Boatwright said. The goal of summer initiatives was to overcome summer lulls that the company has seen in the past few years, he added.
The chain also launched its first 'Summer of Extras,' a three-month gamified program that offers extra points, badges and prizes to rewards members. New membership in the rewards program grew 14% year over year.
'We drove incremental frequency versus normal behavior across all frequency bands, including low frequency,' Boatwright said. 'Of the 5 million, 2 million were low-frequency users that are now engaging with the brand throughout summer on a more consistent basis.'
Boatwright added that the chain plans to do another program in the fall targeting college students.
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