Steve Salis of Catalogue restaurant group will launch Pizza TBD, a hybrid Roman-style and Detroit-style pan pizza shop, with Ensemble Digital Kitchen in July. Pizza TBD follows Michelin Bib Gourmand concepts Honeymoon Chicken and Federalist Pig as brands offered on the Ensemble digital hub, based in Bethesda, Md.
Wix has integrated with DoorDash Drive to provide restaurants with a way to accept orders directly on their website, Dine App or fully-branded app. Through the white-label fulfillment program from DoorDash, restaurants can manage their delivery orders.
Wingstop will debut in Spain with the upcoming openings of two ghost kitchens in Madrid. Two additional, delivery-only locations of the fast-casual chicken-wings chain in Spain’s capital will follow. Partnering with a logistics-kitchen provider made this market entry possible. It precedes large-scale growth in Spain, which has become a key target growth market for Wingstop.
Saladworks will open 20 new delivery locations across Central Florida through an agreement with Combo Kitchen. Customers throughout the territory will be able to start ordering delivery from Saladworks as early as March 25. Combo Kitchen’s franchise system partner, WingHouse Bar & Grill, will prepare these orders inside dark kitchens.
Chicago’s The Cumin Bowl and its customizable Indian bowls expanded into Atlanta through a partnership with Franklin Junction. The new location landed at a Buckhead UPop convenience store by Savi Provisions. Dark-kitchen operator Franklin Junction enabled the entry into the Atlanta market through its host kitchen program.
Kitchen United MIX launched a new ghost kitchen center inside a Kroger in The Heights neighborhood of Houston, Texas. Through the MIX platform, Kroger customers will order food from various restaurants. This can be done online, via mobile or at a kiosk in-person.
Wow Bao will accelerate its ghost kitchen program in Canada through an expanded agreement with Ghost Kitchen Brands. The partnership deployed eight Ghost Kitchen Brands locations, today, February 11. Additional points of sale will open in Alberta by the end of the first quarter.
The Wingstop restaurant of the future was unveiled, serving as a digital-ordering-focused prototype of the chicken-wing chain. The store will power the testing of different new equipment and layouts. Located on Lovers Lane in Dallas, Texas, it will also resemble a test kitchen, becoming an innovation hub for flavor exploration.
Fuku Lexington, Ky. is the newest home of the concept’s elevated chicken sandwiches, as it opens within the delivery perimeter of the University of Kentucky. The new opening was made possible through a deal with Franklin Junction, a dark-kitchen network that provides access to major brands through off-premises dining. Fuku’s food will be offered on major third-party delivery providers, including through UberEats, DoorDash, Grubhub, and Postmates.
TGI Fridays has been capitalizing on its digital evolution and virtual platforms to grow. According to fiscal year-to-date results, For 41 consecutive weeks, Fridays posted comp(arable) sales growth compared to pre-pandemic numbers from 2019. Also, it increased comp sales by double digits in the latter half of 2021, compared to 2019.
