---
title: "Nation’s Restaurant News Announces 2018 Golden Chain Award Winners"
url: https://burnaze.com/article/c1272f40-523b-4dd9-b98f-7b44457750e0
source: "1851 Franchise"
original_url: https://1851franchise.com/nations-restaurant-news-announces-2018-golden-chain-award-winners-2708022
category: "Restaurants"
industry: "Restaurants"
topics: ["Finance & M&A"]
published: 2018-10-01T16:11:01.000Z
modified: 2026-11-01T02:39:37.503Z
image: https://newimage.1851franchise.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=85,format=webp,width=1280,height=720/story/featureImage/66b76be25f0ddb16c0ea4575e2b996305632.jpg
---

# Nation’s Restaurant News Announces 2018 Golden Chain Award Winners

**TL;DR:** Nation's Restaurant News announces the 2018 Golden Chain Award winners, honoring multi-unit restaurant executives who demonstrate key leadership qualities. The winners include executives from Del Taco, McDonald's, Smoothie King, Red Robin, and Longhorn Steakhouse.

*originally published in 1851 Franchise on 2018-10-01. [Read the original](https://1851franchise.com/nations-restaurant-news-announces-2018-golden-chain-award-winners-2708022).*

## Story

Each year, Nation’s Restaurant News honors a handful of multi-unit restaurant executives who have demonstrated “key leadership qualities, including a commitment to excellence, the ability to build strong teams and the foresight to see where the industry is headed.” This year’s Golden Chain Award winners include executives from Del Taco, McDonald’s, Smoothie King, Red Robin and Longhorn Steakhouse.

The restaurant-industry publication also announced the winner of its Norman Award, named for Brinker International Inc. founder Norman Brinker. Each year’s Norman Award honors a “restaurant executive who consistently mentors and inspires, as Brinker did, future restaurant brand leaders.” This year’s Norman Award honoree is Paul Brown, CEO of Inspire Brands, the parent company of Arby’s, Buffalo Wild Wings and Sonic that was formed earlier this year.

Both the Golden Chain Awards and the Norman Awards will be celebrated on Tuesday at the Multi-Unit Foodservice Operators Conference in Dallas.

## Entities

- 1851 Franchise (publication)
- Restaurants (sector)
- McDonald's (company)
- Nation's Restaurant News (publication)
- Multi-Unit (company)
- Smoothie King (company)
- Arby's (company)
- Inspire Brands (company)
- Del Taco (company)
- Buffalo Wild Wings (company)
- Red Robin (company)
- Sonic (company)

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Originally reported by 1851 Franchise (https://1851franchise.com/nations-restaurant-news-announces-2018-golden-chain-award-winners-2708022). Summarized by Burnaze (https://burnaze.com/article/c1272f40-523b-4dd9-b98f-7b44457750e0).