Affordable, familiar and reassuring are the features that make American chain restaurants a near-ubiquitous presence throughout the country; it is almost as if they are baked into our roadside culture.
Despite well-documented financial struggles, a tough economy and shifting diet trends, these restaurants withstand time.
This series explores why these places have such strong staying power and how they stay afloat at a time of rapid change.
Go back to read our first two pieces on how these restaurants trigger nostalgia and how these places stay afloat in a tough economy.
The magical cheese pull.
It's a viral social media trend and a powerful marketing tool, where diners post videos of themselves slowly pulling apart gooey strings of cheese from a steaming hot slice of pizza or deep-fried mozzarella sticks.
A good one brings in millions of views and, increasingly, helps lure diners off their phones and into seats.
Sara Rafael, 23, flew from Ireland to New York City in November. She and her mother had a list of must-stop eats, including Olive Garden, The Cheesecake Factory, Raising Cane's — all of which were discovered on TikTok, Rafael tells NPR.
The platform's food videos – including those trendy cheese pulls – she says, "always make the food look so appetizing." So, most of her dining itinerary consisted of mid-tier American chains straight from the recommendations of strangers online.
This is a critical moment for restaurants, says Stephen Zagor, a restaurant industry expert, consultant and adjunct professor at Columbia Business School.
With many American diners spending less and eating at home more, restaurants, especially older chains, risk fading into what he calls "the wallpaper."
Zagor says that every restaurant needs to "have a viral moment" either in their menu or inside the restaurant in order to survive now.
But, he admits, the tradeoff is "a certain loss of authenticity."
Chili's cheese pull moment
Few restaurants, particularly chains, have ridden the viral cheese pull wave as well as Tex-Mex national chain, Chili's.
Its Triple Dipper – a mix-and-match trio of appetizers and sauces – has become popular online thanks to the thick, stretchy fried mozzarella sticks. The company tells NPR it sold 41 million Triple Dippers in fiscal year 2025.
And that's been a boon to the company's bottom line. The Triple Dipper accounted for approximately 10% of sales in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2024. A year later, that figure rose to 15% of sales, according to data Chili's shared with NPR.
Chili's Chief Marketing Officer George Felix says the sales numbers reflect "a massive gain in a short amount of time" for a company the size of Chili's. "Essentially 100% of that can be attributed to social media," he says.
Once it became clear just how popular the menu item was, the company's culinary team leaned into the fandom and innovated on the fried mozzarella sticks by developing Nashville Hot and Honey-Chipotle flavors, Felix says.
For a 50-year-old chain restaurant that had been suffering from the "wallpaper" effect, Zagor says, this was a huge boost in helping the restaurant stage a stunning comeback.
"I think it speaks to the fact that Chili's is back in the culture," Felix says, Chili's chief marketing officer.
@karissaeats Drink every time I say cheesy 😭 #foodie#fyp#redlobster#eating ♬ Idyllic jazz bossa nova with piano and guitar(1298871) - TAKANORI ONDA
In a crowded market, content, and cheese pulls, are king
Content creators like Karissa Dumbacher, who focuses on food posts as @karissaeats, has made a host of videos about Chili's, including one listed as a paid partnership that's received 2 million likes documenting none other than the iconic cheese pull.
She's found the recipe to success for making a video pop on social media.
"The first three to five seconds of the video has to pull you in visually," she explains. "People are gonna stick around to see if it's worth it, and that's what you want. That's why so many people go for the cheese pull."
Dumbacher has posted consistently since first beginning her TikTok journey during a COVID quarantine in Beijing. Almost daily she posts "everything I ate" videos from her home, fast food chains, casual chains and high-end, gourmet restaurants in the U.S. and abroad.
Her recording style has garnered her a legion of more than 4.5 million followers on TikTok alone.
Even though viewers have a chance to virtually travel the world and eat alongside her at luxury restaurants, Dumbacher says she still finds that her videos from classic chain restaurants like the Cheesecake Factory do "really, really well."
And while Dumbacher has found success eating at casual sit-down establishments, the restaurants themselves benefit as well from the extra air time.
"Most people that are posting these viral videos aren't getting paid by the restaurants, and it's creating a bunch of traffic. So it's huge," she says. "That's why there's so much money going into TikTok, YouTube, Instagram ads these days, as opposed to ads on TV or billboards."
Michael Lindquist, senior vice president of social for the media company, BarkleyOKRP, says social media "is now what I would consider a key business driver" and "an infinite feedback loop" for businesses.
Lindquist works in the company's social content studio that works with brands like Red Lobster, Marco's Pizza and others.
"It really does start and end on social media," he says. "So you're starting to see even broadcast and TV campaigns that take more of their cues from social [media] behavior, and comments and the way that we interact with one another."
But Zagor, the restaurant industry expert, says virality can only get restaurants so far.
"You would like all businesses to be organic, because people love it, and they come back because the food is great," Zagor says. "Not because you saw this incredible dessert, and [say], 'Wow, I need to have that.'"
Zagor teaches college students and is struck by their focus on documenting the meal for social media instead of eating. He says he asks his students how many of them take pictures of their food:
"Everyone raises their hand. And then I say, 'How many of you take more pictures of your food than you do of your family and friends?' And they all raise their hands."
For Zagor, that's concerning. So much of the human experience now, including eating at a restaurant, is focused on capturing the perfect, photographable moment rather than an organic, enjoyable, social experience.
"And something's just weird about that."
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