3 Reasons Chipotle Is the Most Important Restaurant Today

By Brian Jasper

There are more successful restaurants. (McDonalds still does ten times the business Chipotle does.) There are more famous restaurants. (Alinea, anyone?) But when it comes to influencing the way you eat, there's no bigger name in the restaurant business than Chipotle, that little Americanized Mexican joint from Colorado. You've probably been there, ordered off their selective menu. And if you're not *completely insane*, you've recognized it as being much, much better than other Mexican spots. Chipotle isn't just good. It's the best. And it's better than virtually every other restaurant - fast food or not - out there.



Don't believe me? Try these on for size:

1. Chipotle is changing the food supply

Whether you eat at Chipotle or not, the food you eat at restaurants in the future is likely to be more local and have less hormones than food you ate in the past. Chipotle's bold and very public mission is outlined on their website and in their stores. Daianna Karaian compared a trip to Chipotle with a prior trip to McDonalds:

"Compare my experience at Chipotle. On entering, I was greeted by the fast food chain's mission on a sign that takes pride of place ahead of its menu - 'We serve ingredients raised with respect for animals, farmers and the environment.'"

Chipotle's practices are becoming the benchmark in the restaurant industry. Just ask Friends of the Earth, a group who helped to create the "Chain Reaction" report, which grades restaurants on their use of antibiotics in food.



Chipotle received an 'A'. Restaurants such as Taco Bell, Olive Garden, Applebee's and more all received F's, without earning even a single point out of the thirty-six available.

2. Chipotle is improving conditions for workers

Chipotle wants you - or someone you know - to work for them. On Wednesday, September 9th, they held a career day, with the goal of hiring 4,000 employees. What's more, the Dayton Daily News reports:

"But what sets Chipotle apart in the restaurant industry, he says, is the ability for someone who starts out warming tortillas to rise the ranks. Managers can earn five figure salaries and the most elite top managers can earn annual pay of six figures, according to the company.



"However, Chipotle offers further positions for advancement including restaurateur, apprentice team leader, team leader and so on, Athey said.



"As a result, Chipotle tends to see greater employee retention the higher up the corporate ladder, Arnold, of the corporate Colorado office, said."

Chipotle also pays better than most fast food restaurants, with wages in most markets starting around $10. Compared to their rivals (via Fast Company):

"Another standard fast-food practice is to pay employees as little as possible, while Chipotle's practice is to pay more, but to dismiss employees who lack energy or are otherwise mediocre performers (One industry observer marveled, 'Who ever heard of a fast-food restaurant firing someone for being mediocre?')."

Chipotle's handling of their employees and interest in development of these employees, stands in stark contrast to many of their competitors. Chipotle, on the attack, has even tried to shame other restaurants into providing better conditions for their workers:

"The predominant goal [for traditional fast food chains] is the cheapening of the raw ingredients, the automation of the work such that anyone could do it ... so that they turn over their employees without any care for them, where it's a game of value meals and cheapening the food experience.



"That is traditional fast food, and we think that's going away. We, and others like us, will replace that."

3. Chipotle created a whole new restaurant category

There were restaurants *like* Chipotle before there was Chipotle. But no restaurant demanded a whole recategorization of restaurants like Chipotle did, and the other restaurants in the new category are just along for a ride.



With a small, focused menu, Chipotle emphasizes only what it does really well. Other restaurants, such as Five Guys Burgers & Fries, have followed suit. A small menu may seem like it is a trade-off for customization, but the opposite is actually true, with Ashley Lutz of Business Insider pointing out that it is actually the big chains' huge menus and value meals which "give the perception that options are limited." Not unlike stale, former heavyweight, Subway, Chipotle customers build their meals as they order it, ensuring they get what they want and only what they want.



Heck, this plan is so foolproof, other restaurants are following suit. Taco Bell is opening a Chipotle-like restaurant called Cantina. The pizza industry has also been ripe for Chipotle knockoffs:

"Pie Five, a chain based near Dallas that was started four years ago, has plenty of competition in trying to become the 'Chipotle of Pizza.' Pieology Pizzeria, Blaze Pizza and Mod Pizza are among the companies seeking the title. And Chipotle itself has its own pizza business - Pizzeria Locale - that it says has the only rightful claim to the designation."

Believe it or not, McDonald's once owned a sizable stake in Chipotle, helping the company expand when it was still in its nascence. Again from Fast Company:

"McDonald's sold its stake in Chipotle in 2006, and since then, Chipotle has moved farther and farther away from the typical fast food way of doing business."

Think McDonald's ever wishes it still had some ownership in one of the world's fastest growing and most successful chains?



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