Top 200 Restaurants 2008 Results Broken down by Sector

September 2009
Food Service and Hospitality

Limited-service restaurants grew sales by 2.5% over 2007 to $16 billion, accounting for 70.1% of the Top 200 Canadian chains' sales. The segment's 19,323 units made up 85.8% of the Top 200 total store count, showing a decline of 0.6% from the previous year. Though fast-casual restaurants are a relatively small portion of limited-service sales at 1.9%, their sales grew 11.7%. Chains to watch are U.S. players Panera Bread and Chipotle Mexican Grill, both of which expanded into Canada last year. The fastest growing limited-service clusters were Asian, at 14.5%, Mexican at 7.3% and Donut with 7.1% growth.

Major contributors in these clusters were Tim Hortons, growing at 7.7% (Donut), Sushi Shop and Thai Express at 40% and 51.2% respectively (Asian), and Taco Del Mar at 32.4% (Mexican). Full-service restaurants represented 29.9% of the Top 200 chain sales, or $6.8 billion, growing 4.2% over 2007. Full-service outlets represent 14% of the Top 200 chains' total units, after declining by 1.1% to 3,207 in 2008.