---
title: "Chili’s, Taco Bell and Wingstop"
url: https://burnaze.com/article/a184c5bb-2eca-4c54-90fe-94b54063dafb
source: "Nation's Restaurant News"
original_url: https://www.nrn.com/casual-dining/chili-s-taco-bell-and-wingstop
author: "Lisa Jennings, Bret Thorn"
category: "Chicken"
industry: "Restaurants"
segment: "Chicken"
published: 2026-04-30T16:00:00.000Z
modified: 2026-10-31T13:19:40.477Z
image: https://eu-images.contentstack.com/v3/assets/bltea7aee2fca050a19/blt548cc73367ae8158/69f25da512451264d00ad577/3_Chili_s.png?width=1280&auto=webp&quality=80&disable=upscale
---

# Chili’s, Taco Bell and Wingstop

**TL;DR:** Chili's reported its 20th consecutive quarter of same-store sales growth, driven by a new chicken sandwich lineup. Bret Thorn is a food and beverage editor with expertise in restaurant trends and cuisine.

*By Lisa Jennings, Bret Thorn, originally published in Nation's Restaurant News on 2026-04-30. [Read the original](https://www.nrn.com/casual-dining/chili-s-taco-bell-and-wingstop).*

## Story

He is the co-host of a podcast, Menu Talk with Pat and Bret, which features interviews with chefs, food & beverage authorities, and other experts in foodservice operations.

From 2005 to 2008 he also wrote the Kitchen Dish column for The New York Sun, covering restaurant openings and chefs’ career moves in New York City.

A magna cum laude graduate of Tufts University in Medford, Mass., with a bachelor’s degree in history, and a member of Phi Beta Kappa, Thorn also studied traditional French cooking at Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Cuisine in Paris. He spent his junior year of college in China, studying Chinese language, history and culture for a semester each at Nanjing University and Beijing University. While in Beijing, he also worked for ABC News during the protests and ultimate crackdown in and around Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Thorn’s monthly column in Nation’s Restaurant News won the 2006 Jesse H. Neal National Business Journalism Award for best staff-written editorial or opinion column.

Thorn wrote the entry on comfort food in the Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America, 2nd edition, published in 2012. He also wrote a history of plated desserts for the Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets, published in 2015.

Bret Thorn’s areas of expertise include food and beverage trends in restaurants, French cuisine, the cuisines of Asia in general and Thailand in particular, restaurant operations and service trends.

Nation’s Restaurant News, food & beverage editor, 1999-Present New York Sun, columnist, 2005-2008 Asia Times, sub editor, 1995-1997 Manager magazine, senior editor and restaurant critic, 1992-1997 ABC News, runner, May-July, 1989

Education: Tufts University, BA in history, 1990 Peking University, studied Chinese language, spring, 1989 Nanjing University, studied Chinese language and culture, fall, 1988 Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Cuisine, Cértificat Elémentaire, 1986

## Entities

- Restaurants (sector)
- Nation's Restaurant News (publication)
- Taco Bell (company)
- restaurant operations (topic)
- Wingstop (company)
- Chili's (company)
- ABC (company)
- same-store sales growth (topic)
- food trends (topic)
- Bret Thorn (person)
- chicken sandwich lineup (topic)

---
Originally reported by Lisa Jennings, Bret Thorn, Nation's Restaurant News (https://www.nrn.com/casual-dining/chili-s-taco-bell-and-wingstop). Summarized by Burnaze (https://burnaze.com/article/a184c5bb-2eca-4c54-90fe-94b54063dafb).