LONGHORN STEAKHOUSE 9

Like its sister concept Olive Garden, LongHorn continues to reap benefits from Darden’s decision to underprice inflation (400 basis points over the past three years, industry-wide). LongHorn set weekly sales records multiple times in its most recent quarter. The brand’s average weekly sales of $96,905 pulled out to annualized volumes of $5.01 million. That’s a major jump from 2020, when it was $76,101. LongHorn’s total sales of $1.9 billion represented a company record as well. Comps rose 10.8 percent and the chain enjoyed 17.4 percent margin, 80 basis points higher, year-over-year. When Darden acquired LongHorn, it closed the following year (2008) with 305 locations. That would balloon to 514 by 2019 and now sits at 554.