Chili’s to Bring Back Red Leather Booths and Tile Tables in Dallas Restaurant

Chili’s is reintroducing red-leather booths, colorful tile tables without grout, and prints of its original 1975 menu to restaurant walls. The new design debuts in Dallas, the city where the chain was founded more than five decades ago. Kevin Hochman, CEO of Brinker International and president of Chili’s, spoke to CNN in early June over chips and salsa.

“Our objective is we want to make Chili’s more Chili’s,” he said. Hochman joined Brinker in 2022 and has overseen 20 consecutive quarters of same-store sales growth along with double-digit rises in traffic. Starting next year the company plans to remodel about 10 percent of its roughly 1,200 U.S.

Restaurants each year. The chain has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on minor improvements in recent years after restaurant appearances went untouched for more than two decades. Chili’s is the second-largest casual-dining chain by revenue in the United States, according to Technomic.

It has captured a meaningfully larger share of visitors from full-service and fast-food rivals, Placer.ai data show. Average guest checks remain $3 to $4 below the casual-dining average, supported by value meals such as the “3 for Me” option that starts at $10.99. Revenue has grown nearly 50 percent since 2022.

Hochman said the company consulted founder Larry Levine on the redesign and expects the nostalgic elements to generate word-of-mouth traffic.