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Brinker International runs two casual dining restaurant chains, Chili's Grill & Bar and Maggiano's Little Italy, and makes money by selling food and drinks to diners.
Brinker International is a restaurant company that most people actually know through its signs rather than its corporate name. It runs Chili's Grill & Bar, a casual chain built around burgers, ribs, fajitas, and margaritas, and Maggiano's Little Italy, a family-style Italian chain that serves big platters meant to be shared at the table. You pay for a meal, and Brinker keeps the difference between what the food and labor cost and what the menu charges.
Chili's is the engine of the whole thing. It is one of the largest casual dining brands in the United States, with restaurants across the country and franchised locations abroad, and its menu aims squarely at families and value-conscious diners. Maggiano's is much smaller — a handful of restaurants in the U.S. — and leans toward big-portion dinners and private events. The company is headquartered in Dallas, Texas, but the location matters less than the model: sit-down restaurants that need steady foot traffic to cover rent, staff, and food costs. Casual dining is a brutal business. Chains like Darden Restaurants and Texas Roadhouse fight for the same customers, and fast-casual spots and fast food keep pulling people away with cheaper, quicker meals. Brinker's answer has been to lean into value and marketing — pushing promotions and its loyalty program to get people through the doors — while keeping a close eye on food and labor costs, which eat a large share of every dollar rung up. When traffic slips, profits can fall fast because restaurant costs are largely fixed.
Franchising helps: at franchised locations, outside operators put up the money and run the restaurant, and Brinker collects fees and royalties instead of carrying all the risk. The company also spends real money on remodeling restaurants and on technology like kitchen equipment and ordering systems meant to speed up service. In recent years the stock has been a strong performer as Chili's regained momentum, which is why a ticker that sounds like an instruction — EAT — has gotten more attention than its plain corporate name ever did.
Saved answer · last researched 15 Nov 2026