Below is a snapshot of 30 restaurant stocks sorted by year-to-date performance. The average stock on the list is up 16.5% on the year, about three percentage points better than the cap-weighted S&P 500 (SPY) but right in line with the equal-weight S&P 500’s (RSP) gain of 16.3%.
There’s some wide performance disparity across the restaurant space, as is usually the case. Eleven of the stocks listed are up 20%+ YTD, while nine are down 10%+.
Two restaurant stocks have separated themselves from the pack this year with gains of more than 120%: Cheesecake Factory (CAKE) and Cracker Barrel (CBRL).
We highlighted CAKE in a post earlier this month, so below is a look at the price chart for Cracker Barrel (CBRL), this year’s other big winner in the restaurant space.
A year ago this week, Cracker Barrel’s (CBRL) CEO Julie Masino announced a company rebrand that included a logo change. The rebrand faced immediate backlash that even President Trump commented on, and within a few weeks, Masino had fully backtracked on the rebrand strategy.
As shown below, shares were more than cut in half from the time the rebrand was announced last August through the end of 2025. But remarkably, shares have now recovered the entire decline one year later!
At the end of July, it was announced that Masino was stepping down as CEO. Her replacement is former Bloomin’ Brands (Outback Steakhouse) CEO David Deno.
With shares back to where they were before the logo controversy began, it’s Deno’s turn now.
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