Two restaurant stocks with some the best long-term expansion opportunities are coffee shop operator Dutch Bros (BROS 6.63%) and Mediterranean fast-casual chain Cava Group (CAVA 0.15%). However, 2025 saw the stocks go in opposite directions, with Cava shares getting cut in half, while Dutch Bros shares are up about 15% year to date, as of this writing.
Let's look at which restaurant stock is poised to outperform next year.
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The case for Cava
NYSE: CAVA
Key Data Points
Everything was going Cava's way until the second quarter of this year. It had just reported four consecutive quarters of double-digit same-store sales growth when the lapping of its popular grilled steak menu item caused its same-store growth to slow considerably. In Q2, its comparable-restaurant sales rose 2.1%, while for Q3 its growth slowed to 1.9%. Meanwhile, its restaurant-level profit margin, which measures the profitability of individual locations before corporate costs, slipped by 100 basis points in Q3 to 24.6%.
In addition, the company lowered its guidance for same-store sales, restaurant-level profit margins, and adjusted EBITDA for the second time in a row when it reported its Q3 results. The market hates companies lowering expectations, which is a big reason why the stock has been crushed this year.
That said, the Cava growth story is far from over, and the company will be facing much easier comparisons in 2026. Cava ended Q3 with only 415 locations, with a goal of opening 1,000 by 2032. The company had been using a coastal smile strategy of focusing on markets in coastal states, but has more recently started expanding into northern midwestern markets. Next year, it is expected to grow its number of units by around 16%, as it continues to enter new markets and in-fill existing ones.
Meanwhile, the company will look to boost same-store sales in 2026 through menu innovation and its rewards program. It's been testing salmon and could launch this new protein next spring. Meanwhile, it's expanding its rewards program and introducing tiered status levels.
The case for Dutch Bros
NYSE: BROS
Key Data Points
While Cava ran into a speed bump in 2025, Dutch Bros has been operating on all cylinders. The company has been seeing strong same-store growth on the back of mobile order-ahead, brand marketing, and menu innovation. However, it has an even bigger potential driver in 2026.
The company has been testing hot food items at select stores, and now plans to roll out the items to three-quarters of its shops that can support these offerings. The lack of hot breakfast items has hurt visits during this part of the day, so the introduction of breakfast items could both boost traffic and lead to higher transaction amounts.
In tests, stores saw a 4% lift to comparable-shop sales, but with marketing initiatives, this boost could become even greater. This opportunity cannot be understated, as Dutch Bros was getting less than 2% of its sales from food, compared to nearly 20% for rival Starbucks.
At the same time, Dutch Bros also has a huge expansion opportunity in front of it. It ended last quarter with fewer than 1,100 shops and plans to open approximately 175 new shops in 2026. Meanwhile, its goal is to have more than 2,000 locations by 2029. Long term, it sees the opportunity to open around 7,000 locations in the U.S.
The verdict
Cava looks like it has the potential to be a very nice turnaround story in 2026. The company is still putting up solid same-store sales growth in a generally tough consumer environment, and it will face much easier comps next year while introducing new menu items to help drive growth.
However, I'm going with Dutch Bros as my pick as I like its long expansion runway and think its hot food opportunity should be a strong boost next year. As such, it's the No. 1 restaurant growth stock I want to own heading into next year.
