Chili's Grill & Bar (stylized as chili's) is an American

casual dining Restaurants fall into several industry classifications, based upon menu style, preparation methods and pricing, as well as the means by which the food is served to the customer. This article mainly describes the situation in the US, while categor ...

restaurant chain founded by Larry Lavine in Texas in 1975 and is currently owned and operated by Brinker International.

History

Chili's first location, a converted postal station on Greenville Avenue in the Vickery Meadows area of

Dallas Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...

, Texas, opened in 1975. The original Chili's on Greenville Avenue moved to a new building on the same site in 1981; It relocated again in 2007. Lavine's concept was to create an informal, full-service dining restaurant with a menu featuring different types of hamburgers offered at an affordable price. The brand grew larger, and by the early 1980s, there were 28 Chili's locations in the region, all featuring similar

Southwest The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A '' compass rose'' is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west— ...

decor. In 1983, Lavine sold the brand to restaurant executive Norman E. Brinker, formerly of the Pillsbury restaurant group that owned Bennigan's.

Advertising

"Chili's (Welcome to Chili's!)" is an

advertising Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a Product (business), product or Service (economics), service. Advertising aims to present a product or service in terms of utility, advantages, and qualities of int ...

jingle used in Chili's Restaurant commercials to advertise the restaurant's line of

baby back ribs Pork ribs are a cut of pork popular in Western and Asian cuisines. The ribcage of a domestic pig, meat and bones together, is cut into usable pieces, prepared by smoking, grilling, or baking – usually with a sauce, often barbecue – and then ...

. The song was written by Guy Bommarito and produced by Tom Faulkner Productions for GSD&M Advertising of

Austin, Texas Austin ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Texas. It is the county seat and most populous city of Travis County, Texas, Travis County, with portions extending into Hays County, Texas, Hays and W ...

. Faulkner sings both "I want my baby back, baby back, baby back ribs..." (Which is similar to the

Tommy James Tommy James (born Thomas Gregory Jackson; April 29, 1947) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer. James is the frontman of the rock band Tommy James and the Shondells, which is known for hit singles such as "Mony Mony", ...

song " Draggin' the Line"), as well as the melodic theme. The deep "Bar-B-Q sauce" line was sung by famed New York bass vocalist Willie McCoy. A 1996 rendition of the jingle features a

doo-wop Doo-wop (also spelled doowop and doo wop) is a subgenre of rhythm and blues music that originated in African-American communities during the 1940s, mainly in the large cities of the United States, including New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, ...

quartet,

Take 6 Take 6 is an American a cappella gospel sextet formed in 1980 on the campus of Oakwood College in Huntsville, Alabama. The group integrates jazz with spiritual and inspirational lyrics. Take 6 has received several Grammy Awards as well as D ...

, singing

a cappella Music performed a cappella ( , , ; ), less commonly spelled acapella in English, is music performed by a singer or a singing group without instrumental accompaniment. The term ''a cappella'' was originally intended to differentiate between Rena ...

. ''

Advertising Age ''Ad Age'' (known as ''Advertising Age'' until 2017) is a global media brand that publishes news, analysis, and data on marketing and media. Its namesake magazine was started as a broadsheet newspaper in Chicago in 1930. ''Ad Age'' appears in ...

'' magazine named the song first on its list of "10 songs most likely to get stuck in your head" in 2004. In October 2017, the jingle was revived to advertise Chili's new menu, where it was re-conceptualized as "Oh Baby, Chili's is Back (Baby, Back, Baby, Back)." In 2008, the chain aired parody ads for "P. J. Bland's," a fictional restaurant chain with cardboard foods. In 2012, Chili's used Wendy Rene's

Stax Stax can refer to: * StAX, (Computer Programming) Streaming API for reading and writing XML in Java * Stax Ltd, a Japanese brand of electrostatic headphones * Stax Records Stax Records is an American record company, originally based in Memphis, ...

single, "Bar-B-Q," in their TV commercial. In September 2017, Chili's dropped about 40 percent of its menu items to focus on burgers, ribs, and fajitas. In February 2020 Chili's announced a new marketing campaign encouraging people to "laugh so hard you pee a little." In September 2024 Chili's announced, that its advertisement campaign is working, while other food chains in the USA still struggle to entice diners into their stores. Store sales increased 14.8 percent in the fiscal fourth quarter of Chili's. In 2024, the Chili's restaurant chain obtained the license for BurgerTime to create a browser-based game called Chili’s Big Smasher BurgerTime. In this version of the game, players control the franchise mascot Joe ChiliHead in a quest to create Big Smasher Burgers across six levels of gameplay. Players who participated also had the chance to win prizes such as free burgers for life.

Locations

As of 2015, they have 1,580 locations worldwide, including 839 that are company-owned and 741 that are franchised.

Legal problems

In October 2008, a Chili's Australia franchise was prosecuted and fined by the

NSW New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a state on the east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria to the south, and South Australia to the west. Its coast borders the Coral and Tasman Seas to the east. T ...

Office of Industrial Relations for underpaying staff, pressuring employees to sign an

Australian workplace agreement An Australian workplace agreement (AWA) was a type of formalised individual agreement negotiated between an employer and employee in Australia that existed from 1996 to 2009. Employers could offer a "take it or leave it" AWA as a condition of empl ...

, and failing to pay in owed wages by a deadline set by the Office of Industrial Relations. In the same year, Chili's announced the permanent closure of all its Australian locations due to poor sales, unprofitability, and non-compliance with the

Fair Work Act 2009 The ''Fair Work Act 2009'' (Cth) is an Act of the Parliament of Australia, passed by the Rudd government to reform the industrial relations system of Australia. Replacing the Howard government's WorkChoices legislation, the Act established ...

. In July 2024, American

rap rock Rap rock is a music genre that developed from the early to mid-1980s, when hip hop DJs incorporated rock records into their routines and rappers began incorporating original and sampled rock instrumentation into hip hop music. Rap rock is co ...

group the

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filed a lawsuit against Chili's parent company Brinker International for

copyright infringement Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of Copyright#Scope, works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the c ...

, claiming that the group's 1994 song "

Sabotage Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening a polity, government, effort, or organization through subversion, obstruction, demoralization (warfare), demoralization, destabilization, divide and rule, division, social disruption, disrupti ...

" has been illegally used to promote Chili's in advertisements on social media starting around November 2022.

Controversies

* 2008: On June 5, a woman from Washington named Anne Paskett filed a class-action suit against Brinker International. Paskett and the rest of the plaintiffs claimed that the restaurant chain's so-called healthier offerings, like the Chili's "Guiltless Black Bean Burger" have nutritional values much different than the ones listed on the menu. Independent laboratory tests were conducted, discovering that the fat content of the items are sometimes double, or even triple, the amount shown on these menus. * 2009: Brinker International fired a Chili's employee for the claim of sexual harassment, only to employ her again after the public outrage. They claimed that her termination was a computer error. * 2018: Brinker International disclosed that its data network had been breached between March and April 2018, exposing the personally identifiable information of its customers. Subsequently, several customers of Chili's filed suit against the company, alleging that its failure to comply with industry standards for

information security Information security is the practice of protecting information by mitigating information risks. It is part of information risk management. It typically involves preventing or reducing the probability of unauthorized or inappropriate access to data ...

and implement adequate data security measures to protect its data networks from the potential danger of a data breach had caused them to incur fraudulent charges on their payment cards. * 2019: Chili's Restaurant was fined after an employee fell into a vat of scalding water. * 2020: Brinker International and its Chili's subsidiary paid to settle sexual harassment allegations from five female employees.

In popular culture

Chili's was a key location in ''

The Office ''The Office'' is the title of several mockumentary sitcoms based on a British series originally created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant as '' The Office'' in 2001. The original series also starred Gervais as manager and primary charac ...

'' season 2 episode 7 " The Client." The episode shows Michael and Jan meeting a client at a local Chili's restaurant after Michael had changed the location of the meeting from Radisson citing Chili's as "the new golf course." On April 7th 2025, the chain opened “The Scranton Branch” an Office themed Chili’s based on the one featured in the show. The Scranton restaurant is the only one in the chain to feature the awesome blossom, which was removed from the full menu in 2008. The Chili's jingle was also used in '' Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me'' where Fat Bastard meets Dr. Evil with the mojo belonging to

Austin Powers ''Austin Powers'' is a series of American satirical spy comedy films created by Mike Myers, who stars as the British spy Austin Powers as well as his arch-nemesis, Dr. Evil. The series consists of '' International Man of Mystery'' (1997), ' ...

. When he sees Mini-Me walk out with the money, startling him, he tries to eat him, thinking he is a baby. After attempting to eat Mini-Me, Fat Bastard suggests that Dr. Evil keeps the mojo, and he gets the baby, and then sings the Chili's Babyback Ribs song. In Season one of " That '90s Show," the recurring character, Fez, mentions Chili's is the location where he and his current lover had met, also making a reference to the Babyback Ribs jingle. Chili's was mentioned several times in the

2010 The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...

road comedy '' Due Date'', starring

Robert Downey Jr. Robert John Downey Jr. (born April 4, 1965), also known as RDJ, is an American actor. One of the highest-grossing actors of all time, his films as a leading actor have grossed over $14 billion worldwide. In 2008, Downey was named by ''Time ...

and Zach Galifianakis. April 5th, 2024, in

, was declared Chili's at 45th & Lamar Day.

References

External links

* {{Portal bar, Companies, Food Companies based in Dallas Restaurants established in 1975 Restaurant chains in the United States Fast-food franchises Tex-Mex restaurants American companies established in 1975 1975 establishments in Texas Multinational restaurant chains