Dive Brief:
- Darden Restaurants, the parent company of LongHorn Steakhouse and Olive Garden, will begin rolling out a new point-of-sale system to drive speedier orders, reduce training time and strengthen its data and insight capabilities at nine brands, executives said on a Q2 2025 earnings call Thursday.
- Investments in customer experience are paying off at individual brands in the form of sales. LongHorn Steakhouse saw 7.5% same-restaurant sales growth year over year, which Darden President and CEO Rick Cardenas credited to years of investment in its dining experience, staff training and food quality.
- At Olive Garden, President Dan Kiernan’s work improving the customer experience contributed to growth. Olive Garden’s comparable sales were up 2% year over year in Q2 2025.
Dive Insight:
Darden’s upcoming POS upgrade will help the brand execute on its plan to attract customers with faster dining experiences.
Each of Darden’s brands is approaching speed in a different way, according to Cardenas. Early results are promising, but there is still a lot of work ahead for each restaurant chain.
“We have to convince our team that this is the right thing,” Cardenas said. “And we have 200,000 people, so it will take a while.
Darden made preserving the guest experience one of its three objectives as it integrates Tex-Mex chain Chuy’s into its systems, according to Cardenas. Chuy’s, which Darden acquired in October, is expected to generate approximately $300 million in sales during fiscal 2025, according to Raj Vennan, SVP and CFO of Darden.
So far, Darden’s overall efforts are paying off. The company’s same-restaurant sales, which excluded Chuy’s and also included Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse for November, rose 2.4% year over year in Q2 2025, up from a 1.1% year over year decline in Q1 2025.
