Roland Gonzalez, who became Church’s Texas Chicken’s CEO in February, has big plans for the chicken brand. The former Church’s COO wants to push the chain into significant growth mode as it targets $2 billion in systemwide sales. That will require growing the brand domestically and internationally, and building on momentum from the initial stages of the brand’s transformation.
Since joining the chain in 2023, Gonzalez played a part in the chain’s update of its consumer-facing technology, which included launching a loyalty program and testing drive-thru voice ordering automation.
While the lion’s share (80%) of the chain’s future unit growth is international, Gonzalez expects the gap between domestic and international expansion to narrow. Church’s, which has over 1,500 units globally, is seeing momentum in the U.S. with new and existing franchisees. The company’s average unit volumes improved by nearly $250,000 in the past few years, and existing franchisees are remodeling their stores and seeing a subsequent uptick in sales, Gonzalez said.
Gonzalez foresees additional opportunities for U.S. sales growth, especially since Church’s Real Rewards program nears 1 million users. The chain also will consider using kiosks and staying open 24/7 at select locations, he said.
“Even though we've had a good amount of success the last couple of years, it's about doubling down and accelerating on all the things that are working really well and fully capturing the opportunity in front of us,” Gonzalez said.
Restaurant Dive spoke with Gonzalez about his experience with the brand, Church’s growth potential and how he will continue to improve franchise relationships and profitability.
Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
RESTAURANT DIVE: What lessons are you bringing from your time as COO into your CEO role?
Roland Gonzalez: Part of our big transformation has been around franchise relations, franchisee profitability and improving operational efficiency in the restaurants, and ultimately the guest experience.
On the operations efficiency front, it's about bringing in more technology. We're a 72-year-old brand, but our size allows us to really be nimble and move fast with a lot of the trends that are happening today. We've been able to plug a lot of those gaps very quickly, and are having outsized effects in our restaurants.
For example, lowering operational complexity allowed us to open up innovations that otherwise would have been more disruptive to the restaurants. When we launched these aggressive promotions of existing products that have more traffic, we're able to really turn them out. And it's really important because coming into 2025, we're positive in traffic. We're one of the few brands in the industry that can say that. The demand for our brand is there and very strong. Now we just have to take advantage of that and, during our peak times, get that throughput so that the guests can get our food quickly.
What technology initiatives led to these results?
We revamped our guest experience platform and within that now we are working on activating artificial intelligence capabilities. Before, to disseminate all the guest information, even open-ended comments, took a lot of time and was very manual. Now, we can be much more targeted to solve root cause problems and put solutions faster through AI on guest experience. That’s one thing that you can expect a lot more from us, not only just in operations, but across the company.
Also, I would say product-level systems, like when to cook our chicken, how much to cook, are also kind of connected to AI. I think that technology can help close the gap in making sure that our chicken is hot and fresh and available throughout all times of the day across the system. Those are two big areas where we're leveraging technology.
What have you been doing to better bolster your franchisee relationships?
There’s three main things. Number one is actively listening. When I stepped into the role as COO a couple of years ago, the first thing I looked at was our engagement surveys of franchisees. I wanted to understand our score and what was driving that score. That led to the second big thing, which is communication.
In the past leadership hadn't been communicating as often as needed, what I like to call predictable communication. That's what I've established with all the franchisees. We can be predictable with what you can expect, when you can expect it, work together on identifying where we're going and explain why we're going that direction. Communication has been a very big pillar of that.
Of course, first and foremost is profitability, and being very open and honest and transparent about where our goals are in relation to profitability, what we're doing to improve franchisee profitability, and establishing that trust as a franchisor. Our franchise profitability is up more than 35% compared to a couple of years ago.
We've been able to exponentially improve franchisee satisfaction through that third-party survey; we've actually gotten awards for the level of engagement that our franchisees have. What that's done is really unlock further investment in the brand.
We had 100 remodels last year. We have another 100-plus that we're going to do this year. We're opening restaurants that are above our trailing AUVs. We have folks that are really doubling down on making sure that the guest experience and the technology, like making digital investments, are unlocking incremental growth.
How has your remodel strategy impacted franchise profitability?
The reason we've been able to get so many franchisees on board with remodels is because it's really having outsized effects. Some of these restaurants are so old and dated. When you remodel them, we're getting a lot more percentage growth than other brands usually would get. The company restaurants that we've done have 15% or more in sales increases.
We’ve been able to optimize the Blaze reimage elements so that you're also mitigating the cost of the remodel. The payback is very attractive. That's really motivated franchisees, in some cases, to actually remodel before they're due because of the business case behind it.
What is your mix between existing franchisees and new franchisees?
It's a mix of both. We are attracting a lot of new, highly capitalized franchisees that are interested in growing. We’re no longer in a transformation state. There's been a lot proven over the last two years that’s led to a mix of new folks coming in. Many other existing franchisees have raised their hands wanting to grow.
One important point is that we’re establishing a culture from a corporate perspective, but also for franchisees, of accountability and recognition internally. I'm a great example of that, growing from within the company. You're going to see a lot more of that meritocracy, but the same with franchisees. The folks that we're growing with are the ones that, over the last two years, have improved their operation scores a tremendous amount and are executing that great guest experience. It’s not only growing, but growing in a strong way.
This year, we're on pace for tremendous growth internationally. Domestically, 2025 will be the first year in many years, we'll be positive in net restaurant growth, and plan on really elevating that for the years to come.
Why have so many chicken chains been doing well internationally?
There's just a lot of untapped market demand for chicken internationally. Pizza and burgers have been on a journey of growth for just a longer period of time with a lot more brands. There's a lot of demand for chicken, but with less time of expansion and also with fewer brands. I think that that's why you're hearing about a lot of those chicken QSR deals internationally.
Internationally, we're Texas Chicken and we do a really good job of making sure that when we enter a market, we're really making a splash in that market. We'll partner with our franchisees, and come up with different strategies.
So for example, in Qatar, there's a place called The Pearl. It's high-end real estate, but if you're there, automatically, now everybody knows that brand. So when you open somewhere else, they’ll say “That’s at The Pearl. Wow, that chicken is really good.” And then so you kind of come in with a really strong investment, believing in the brand, and then that ultimately helps get that market share.
That’s a completely different strategy than the U.S. International customers taste the chicken and they’re willing to pay more money for it. Whereas in the U.S., it’s a lot more of a value play where they’re getting the best chicken at a price that nobody can match.
Where are you seeing value headed at Church’s under your leadership?
While other chains were doing $5 or $6 price points, we were doing $2 or $3 for multiple pieces of chicken and a biscuit. We did that confidently, because even though we would come in with a very aggressive price point, the check average wouldn't just stop at $2 or $3. You'd walk out with an $8 or $9 check because of our upselling. If guests feel that they're coming in and getting a good deal, they'll go ahead and add other items, which really helps level out food costs and helps everything else out.
In the past, we hadn’t fully unlocked the family side of things. Beginning last year, we started having a similar formula. Other brands were doing $30 price points in family meals, where we're coming in at $19.99 and then, ultimately, with the upsell, getting to a $30 check, but really bringing in the traffic because of that.
But you have to believe in your teams. Going back to franchisee trust and credibility that by doing such a promotion, you're going to get that upsell. It's worked out really well. So we're really starting to run on all cylinders with family and individuals at the same time. That’s really exciting, and we plan on continuing to build on that as we further innovate and roll out new products.
What are your goals and strategies for the brand’s future now that you’re CEO?
Continuing to lean into value and quality is something we're definitely going to want to do. There'll be some innovations that lean on our core. People come to us for chicken. We're going to be giving them different variations of that in really cool and innovative ways.
We’ll take smart, calculated risks. You can expect us going into new markets and expanding our brand and our reach into other parts of the U.S. We will be also announcing some big growth outside of the U.S. as we continue to grow that pipeline.
If we were to talk again five years from now, where do you think the brand will be?
I would say we would be cooking with gas. We would have a restaurant portfolio in the U.S. that is the most profitable and one of the fastest growing chains. Internationally, we would have put our pipeline into fruition, more than doubling the size of international. We will have one of the best operational, efficient and high guest experiences that you can have. We would be a leader in digital and surpass our competitors today. Those are just some elements that would come to mind but, certainly, we would eclipse the $2 billion that we're chasing in systemwide sales. We would be well beyond that potentially in five years, pushing $3 billion.
