So-called slop bowl restaurants have had a rough go of it lately.
Their decline has been breathlessly chronicled by the media (BI included) since mid-2025, when demand started to slow. The reason was simple: At a time of rising inflation and consumer-spending pullbacks, paying anywhere from $15 to $25 for a semi-soupy mixture of protein, vegetables, and grains started to lose its appeal.
Don't get me wrong. The holy trinity of slop bowl purveyors — Cava, Sweetgreen, and Chipotle — still make tasty food. No one is disputing that. It's just that the product can be approximated with relative ease using at-home ingredients. Budget-conscious customers started opting for that.
In the time since, one of the three has bucked the trend and emerged as the clear-cut winner: Cava. During allegedly lean times for slop bowls, the company actually raised its forecasts for annual sales and same-store sales during its most recent earnings report.
To see just how anomalous its outperformance is, check out this comparison of same-store sales growth for the most recent earnings period:
- Cava: +9.7%
- Sweetgreen: -12.8%
- Chipotle: +0.5%
Now check out the relative stock performance of the three restaurants over the past six months. Cava is dominating.
What's Cava's secret sauce? For one, it offers a wide range of protein options — six, to be exact — at a time when GLP-1 weight-loss drugs have driven demand for them. Fellow slop-bowl competitors have rushed to catch up, with Chipotle unveiling its first high-protein menu in late 2025, but Cava has the edge.
Another consideration is that Cava hasn't raised prices on chicken and falafel bowls, which are among their most affordable items. In an economy wracked by inflation, the restaurant has toed the line.
What does Wall Street think? Following the most recent earnings report, Cava stock has 17 buys, 13 holds, and just one sell. The average 12-month price target is 15% above current levels.
New research from RBC was high on the report, and pointed out that lower-income customers were the biggest source of strength last quarter, bucking the K-shaped economy trend. JPMorgan, meanwhile, lauded management's decision to absorb inflationary pressures, rather than pass them along to customers. The firm says that kept in-store traffic strong.
So the next time you hear (or read) about the demise of the slop bowl restaurant, realize that some nuance is required. Customers aren't necessarily steering away entirely. They're probably just going to Cava.
