Despite claiming to serve the “world’s greatest hamburgers,” Fuddruckers has shrunk from hundreds of locations nationwide to just 44 restaurants today.
“Fuddruckers is the Blockbuster of the burger world,” Las Vegas-based business coach Brad Sugars told Fox News Digital.
Restaurateur Phil Romano, founder of Romano’s Macaroni Grill, opened the first Fuddruckers in Texas in 1979, and the chain expanded rapidly during the 1980s.
Fuddruckers operated between 200 and 500 locations at its peak in the late ’80s, according to Tasting Table.
The company began to struggle and changed owners multiple times.
Luby’s acquired Fuddruckers in 2010 after its parent company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
Luby’s announced it would liquidate Fuddruckers in 2020, and entrepreneur Nicholas Perkins — through his Houston-based company, Black Titan Franchise Systems — bought the chain in 2021 for a reported $18.5 million.
“I think with a new, reinvigorated management team, with a strategic plan … we are going to be able to put our brand on offense and not be so much on the defense like we have been in recent years,” Perkins told the Houston Chronicle at the time.
The COVID-19 pandemic took its toll on Fuddruckers, as it did on many restaurants. The National Restaurant Association reported that six months into the pandemic, 100,000 restaurants had closed — either permanently or long-term.
Sugars, who owns two restaurants, said Fuddruckers failed to adapt to changing customer preferences — both in the food consumers want and how they want to consume it.
“One of the biggest challenges in the restaurant game is moving with the times, and the bigger the business, the harder it is,” Sugars said. “It’s a rare brand that continues over 10, 20, 30, 40 years without changing.”
Sugars pointed to Domino’s as an example of a restaurant chain that listened to customers and evolved accordingly.
After admitting its pizza quality had declined, Domino’s improved its food while adding wings, pizza bites, hot sandwiches and other menu items, Sugars said.
The company also built customer loyalty by becoming “a technology company that sells pizza,” Sugars said — while creating an app that’s “way better” than competitors.
“In a world where delivery is now something everyone expects from every restaurant, Domino’s went from competing with other pizza companies to competing with every single type of food that can be delivered from Postmates, Grubhub, etc.,” he said.
Domino’s has also invested in researching customer habits, Sugars said. Much like Amazon, Domino’s knows “what you’re going to buy and when,” allowing it to target consumers more effectively.
“I don’t see a Fuddruckers app,” Sugars said.
Still, Fuddruckers has some fans left.
A Reddit forum a year ago asked, “What happened to Fuddruckers? I thought the food was really good, but it looks like they are all closing.”
Commenters suggested Fuddruckers’ large, warehouse-style atmosphere — similar to a “theme restaurant” — fell out of favor with customers.
Someone who claimed to have managed the first franchise wrote that “specialized concepts have a shelf life. As unique as the original Fudds was, it probably ran its course.”
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