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America’s Favorite Restaurant Chains: The 10 most belovedAmerica’s Favorite Restaurant Chains: The 10 most beloved

Consumers add snacks to the list of their favorite things

Leigh Anne Zinsmeister, Managing Editor

January 14, 2025

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Click through the gallery to meet America’s 10 favorite restaurant chains.Courtesy of the restaurant companies

In Nation’s Restaurant News’ second year of analyzing the Technomic America’s Favorite Chains data, we found some surprising restaurants and some not-at-all surprising ones. Like last year, consumers skew toward steakhouses when dining out, but in the past year they’ve added snack brands to their rosters of most-loved chains.

The above gallery features the 10 restaurants with the highest overall scores, and also breaks down each brand by the factors consumers are surveyed about: service and hospitality, unit appearance and ambiance, food and beverage, convenience and takeout, and value.

The companies have scores for each factor, presented as percentages. Percentages represent a composite top-box rating, indicating the share of recent guests who gave the brand the highest possible rating for each of the guest experience attributes.

Click through the gallery to meet America’s 10 favorite restaurant chains.

Technomic’s America’s Favorite Chains is produced using data from Technomic Ignite Consumer. For more information and detailed data from Technomic, please visit technomic.com/ignite-consumer.

About the Author

Leigh Anne Zinsmeister

Managing Editor

Leigh Anne Zinsmeister is a managing editor for Informa’s Foodservices Vertical, specifically Nation’s Restaurant News, Restaurant Hospitality, and Foodservice Director.  Leigh Anne works on all of the brands’ special reports, including Nation’s Restaurant News’ annual Top 500 report and Restaurant Hospitality’s Best Cocktails and Best Sandwiches contests. She also manages the group’s digital engagement team, and was the managing editor for Supermarket News until December 2024.

Leigh Anne lives in New York City, but also claims Phoenix, Dallas and Cleveland as hometowns. Leigh Anne holds a bachelor’s degree in print journalism from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University, where she also studied European history. 

Email Leigh Anne at [email protected] 

Leigh Anne Zinsmeister’s experience: 

  • Group Managing Editor, Informa’s Foodservices Vertical (Aug. 2021-present)

  • Group Content Manager, Informa Restaurant and Food Group (Feb. 2020-Aug. 2021)

  • Digital Content Manager, Informa Restaurant and Food Group (April 2018-Feb. 2020)

  • Digital Content Producer, Informa Restaurant and Food Group (June 2016-April 2018)

  • Community Moderator, Mail Online (March 2014-June 2016)

  • Wire Editor, Gannett’s Phoenix Design studio (The Arizona Republic, The Reno Gazette-Journal, The Statesman Journal, The Great Falls Tribune, The Visalia Times-Delta, The Tulare Advance Register, The Salinas Californian, The St. George Spectrum, The Desert Sun, The Coloradoan) (Jan. 2012-March 2014)

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