Chili's dropped another chicken sandwich this week, and they made sure everyone knew it was aimed squarely at McDonald's. The marketing angle isn't subtle — full-service casual dining taking swings at the biggest fast food chain on the planet. Bold move. But here's the thing: if you're running a BBQ restaurant or catering operation, this isn't just entertainment industry gossip. There's actually something useful buried in here about where protein trends are heading and what that means for your production planning.
I've been watching the chicken sandwich wars since Popeyes kicked everything off back in 2019. What started as a social media moment turned into a legitimate shift in how chains think about their menus. And now we're seeing full-service restaurants jumping in — not because they need to compete with drive-thrus, but because chicken has become the protein that bridges every demographic gap.
Why Everyone's Fighting Over Chicken Right Now
McDonald's has been pushing hard on protein messaging lately. They want customers to see them as more than burgers and fries — they're actively reminding people that chicken is a real part of their menu. When a company that size starts repositioning around a protein category, the ripple effects hit operators at every level.
Chili's jumping in with their own chicken sandwich (and explicitly calling out McDonald's quality in their marketing) signals something that matters to commercial BBQ operations: chicken isn't going anywhere, and the quality bar keeps rising.
For years, BBQ restaurants treated chicken as the afterthought protein. The thing you put on the menu for the one person in the group who doesn't eat beef. Maybe some wings, maybe a half chicken if you were feeling ambitious. But that's changed. I'm talking to operators now who are running as much smoked chicken as brisket on busy weekends — and the margins are better.
A guy I know runs three food trucks out of the Beaumont area. Last year he started offering smoked chicken thighs with a honey glaze (not unlike what Chipotle's been doing with their returning honey chicken), and it went from a test item to his second-highest seller within two months. His exact words: "I should've been doing this five years ago."
The Production Challenge Nobody Talks About
Here's where the chain restaurant news becomes relevant to your equipment decisions. Running chicken alongside traditional BBQ proteins creates production headaches that brisket-and-ribs purists never had to think about.
Chicken wants different temps. Different timing. Different smoke exposure. And if you're pulling chicken at the same internal temp you'd aim for with a brisket flat — no, wait, let me back up. That's not quite right. The issue isn't the internal temp targets, it's the cook time and moisture management. Chicken dries out faster. It doesn't have the intramuscular fat that lets beef absorb a 12-hour cook. You're working with a protein that needs to be in and out of the smoker in a fraction of the time.
Which means you need equipment that lets you run multiple proteins at different stages without playing temperature Tetris all day.
I've seen operators try to handle this with backyard-style offsets that they scaled up. Works for a while. Then they're running back and forth, opening doors, losing heat, guessing at timing. The inconsistency shows up in the product — and eventually in the reviews.
The rotisserie systems in Southern Pride commercial smokers handle this differently. You can load chicken on different racks, set your hold temps, and let the rotation do the work while you're focused on everything else demanding your attention. The SP-700 especially — I've watched operators run briskets on the lower racks with chicken quarters up top, pulling the chicken at hour three while the beef keeps going. No drama. No scrambling.
What the Generational Data Actually Means
There's been a lot of talk lately about how different generations interact with restaurants. Gen Z wants convenience and digital ordering. Millennials want quality ingredients and some kind of story behind the food. Boomers want consistency and value they understand.
Chicken checks all those boxes in a way that beef struggles to match.
It's cheaper per pound (your margins breathe easier). It cooks faster (your throughput increases). It photographs well when you do it right (social media wins). And it doesn't carry the same environmental baggage that some younger customers attach to beef.
I'm not saying you should pivot away from brisket — that's still the king of Texas BBQ and it's not changing. But if you're looking at your menu and wondering where growth comes from, chicken deserves serious attention.
The chains figured this out. Little Caesars is doing drone delivery tests. Starbucks is redesigning stores around pickup efficiency. Wendy's keeps pushing spicy chicken. These companies spend millions on consumer research, and they're all converging on the same conclusions about convenience, speed, and protein accessibility.
You can learn from that without becoming a fast-food operation.
Equipment That Actually Handles Multi-Protein Production
So let's talk specifics. If you're running a restaurant doing 50+ covers on a Saturday night, or a catering operation handling corporate lunches and weekend events, you need smokers built for the way protein trends are moving.
The mistake I see most often: operators buy equipment sized for their current brisket volume, then wonder why adding chicken creates bottlenecks. Chicken takes less time per piece but often requires more pieces to hit the same revenue. Volume matters.
For mid-volume restaurants — maybe you're doing steady weekday lunch plus busier weekends — the SP-500 gives you enough capacity to run multiple proteins without feeling cramped. The rotisserie keeps everything moving through the heat evenly, which matters more with chicken than most people realize. Uneven cooking is how you end up with dry breast quarters and undercooked thighs in the same batch.
High-volume operations or multi-unit groups need to think bigger. The SP-700 or stepping up to the SP-1000 makes sense when you're doing serious production. I've talked to operators running catering for 300+ person events who tried to make it work with smaller equipment. It's doable, but you're babysitting smokers all day instead of managing your business.
And for the mobile operators — food trucks, competition teams that also do catering — the MLR series exists specifically because Southern Pride understands that not everyone's cooking in a fixed location. Trailer-mounted, built to travel, still gets you that consistent rotisserie performance.
The Parts and Service Reality
I'll be honest about something. Some of the import-brand smokers can produce decent results when they're new. But I've watched operators wait three, four weeks for replacement parts shipped from overseas. Meanwhile their smoker sits cold and they're scrambling to outsource production or turn away business.
Southern Pride builds in the USA. Parts are domestically stocked. When something needs service — and with any commercial equipment, eventually something does — you're not at the mercy of international shipping delays or hoping a distributor happens to have what you need.
Through Southern Pride of Texas, we keep parts on hand and actually understand the equipment. That's not a small thing when your Friday night depends on your smoker working.
Ole Hickory makes decent equipment, I'll give them that. But talk to operators who've run both side by side — the build quality difference shows up over years of hard use. Thicker steel, better-engineered rotisserie systems, hold temps that don't drift. The gap widens the longer you run the equipment.
Where This All Lands
Chili's taking shots at McDonald's over chicken sandwiches might seem like corporate theater. But underneath the marketing, there's a real trend: everyone's fighting for chicken market share because consumer demand keeps climbing.
BBQ operators who recognize this and build production capacity for multi-protein menus are positioning themselves for where the industry's heading. The ones who treat chicken as an afterthought are leaving money on the table.
Get equipment that handles the reality of modern commercial BBQ — not just brisket, but the full protein lineup that today's customers expect. And get it from people who understand the equipment well enough to support you when production pressure hits.
That's the actual takeaway from all this chicken sandwich noise. The chains are telling you where consumers are going. The question is whether your operation's set up to meet them there.
Resources: Southern Pride of Texas | QSR Magazine | Restaurant Business Online
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Photo by Büşranur Aydın on Pexels.
About the Author: Travis operates a competition BBQ team and a Gulf Coast food truck, and documents his commercial cooking process for food service professionals.