Company Man asks 'The Decline of Chi-Chi's...What Happened?'

Today's evergreen educational post is Company Man asking The Decline of Chi-Chi's...What Happened?

In 2004, the chain of Mexican restaurants closed all of its locations. This video explores the history of the brand while identifying some of the main reasons behind its decline.

Here's Company Man Mike's list.


I begin with competition. When my ex-wife, son, and I moved to Ann Arbor in 1989, Chi-Chi's was the only chain Mexican restaurant in town.*  I found it adequate, but not excellent. I had higher standards having grown up in Los Angeles. Other Californians I encountered who moved to Michigan were also disappointed by the lack of the ethnic cuisines they left behind, a story I recounted in Impaling Vlad, or With friends like this, Kunstler hardly needs enemies.

For years, when I ran into another person who had moved to Michigan, I asked them, "So, do you miss Mexican food?" and they invariably answered, "Yes! Do you know where any is around here?" They also missed cheap Cantonese food, too. I was always happy to steer them to the nearest good examples of both.

Within the past decade, Chinese takeout places run by immigrants from the mainland have sprung up all over southeast Michigan, to the point where two of the three small towns on the outskirts of Irish Hills each have one and the next small town I moved to had one as well. Also, Mexican food has become common enough and people have developed enough of a taste for it that the local blues joint that served ribs has become a Mexican restaurant. I no longer run into Californians who can't find the food of home; it's now all around them. I personally consider this to be an improvement.

I still do, but it probably helped doom Chi-Chi's, which I mourned briefly when it closed down, but didn't really miss. There are much better options for Mexican food in Michigan today.

I didn't know the rest of Chi-Chi's story except for the addition of El Torito to the company. That was my favorite chain of Mexican restaurants in southern California, and I was hoping Chi-Chi's would incorporate some of what I liked about them. It didn't happen. That was disappointing, but at least El Torito still exists.

By the way, Company Man Mike mentioned that both Chi-Chi's and El Torito were owned by Foodmaker, which owned Jack-In-The-Box, a story I recounted in Business Insider examines the rise, fall, and return of Twinkies.

Business Insider's video also lists Purina as a former owner of Hostess's parent company from 1984 to 1995. That means I have a distant connection to Hostess, as my first job for a large employer was as cook and cashier for Jack In The Box from 1977 to 1979, which Purina owned from 1968 to 1985. My fellow employees and I joked that we worked for Purina People Chow. Our manager told us to never say that in front of the customers. We didn't.

At least Purina no longer owned Foodmaker by the time it acquired Chi-Chi's, so Chi-Chi's never did serve "Purina people chow."

That's a wrap for today's Retail-Apocalypse-adjacent story. Stay tuned for World Television Day. I have a Storied video to share.

*ETA: There was and still is a locally owned Mexican restaurant in town, Tios, but I never went there.