Chipotle and Chick-fil-A Top Survey of America's Favorite Chain Restaurants

According to a new survey, America's favorite chains are Papa Murphy's, Chipotle, Qdoba, Chick-fil-A, and Jason's Deli. Market Force Information — a customer intelligence solutions company — polled over 12,700 customers about their satisfaction with their "last experience at a given restaurant and their likelihood to recommend it." That data was then averaged to create a "Composite Loyalty Index." The results were then broken down by restaurant category and attributes like fast service, quality of food, and cleanliness.

For the second year in a row, Washington-based chain Papa Murphy's was voted favorite pizza chain, even though an employee was arrested last year for defiling a par-baked pizza. Pizza Ranch came in second, Frito-chili pizza makers Papa John's came in third, followed by Domino's in fourth, and buffet-restaurant Cici's Pizza in fifth. Pizza Hut came in last. Customers found that Papa Murphy's and Little Caesar's had the best value. While it came in second overall, customers really liked Pizza Ranch's atmosphere and friendly service.

When it came to quick-service Mexican food, Qdoba managed to tie with Chipotle for first place. The two chains were neck-and-neck when it came to many attributes like fast service and the quality of food, but customers found that Chipotle has a much better value than Qdoba. Del Taco, however, managed to beat both chains out for best value. El Pollo Loco came in third, while Taco Bell came in last place. People found Taco Bell to be the most unclean and least healthy of all Mexican-American chains.

As for chicken restaurants, Chick-fil-A edged out Louisiana-based Raising Cane's as America's favorite spot. Chicken wing spot, Wingstop came in fourth while KFC came in last. Customers felt that Chick-fil-A had the healthiest options, best atmosphere, and most friendly service out of all the chicken spots. Popeye's was deemed the least healthy, while Church's Chicken had the worst atmosphere. Voters also felt that Buffalo Wild Wings offered the least bang for its buck.

America's favorite sandwich chain is Jason's Deli (a fast casual delicatessen chain headquartered in Beaumont, Texas, United States), with Firehouse Subs coming in second. Arby's was America's least favorite sandwich restaurant, coming in last place when it comes to value and cleanliness as well. Customers were also not a fan of Subway, finding that its food was surprisingly the least healthy and that the chain had the least friendly service. Check out a graph below:

Market Force