Steak 'n Shake bets on MAHA branding, beef tallow shift to drive sales rebound

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Highlights

Steak 'n Shake's 2025 same-store sales rose 10.2% per Biglari Holdings, accelerating to 15% year to date in 2026 amid operational and branding overhaul.
The company will implement a systemwide switch to beef tallow cooking in early 2025, aligning with Make America Healthy Again branding and menu simplification.
Placer.ai data shows 2025 average foot traffic up 3.6% year-over-year but still 25.4% below 2019 levels, while rising beef prices pose input cost risks for quality upgrades.

According to Business Insider, Steak 'n Shake has spent the past several years changing how its restaurants run, moving away from traditional table service toward self-order kiosks and drive-thru traffic. It has also reduced operating hours and trimmed menu items as part of an effort to improve unit-level economics. The chain reworked its franchising model to resemble Chick-fil-A’s approach, featuring a low upfront fee but highly selective operator standards that demand deep commitment. These moves followed a period of steep contraction, with store count falling from a peak of more than 600 in 2018 to roughly 400 today and a near-bankruptcy moment in 2021.

Sales gains tied to tallow, MAHA messaging and niche targeting

The company has aligned itself publicly with the Make America Healthy Again agenda, including a systemwide switch to cooking with beef tallow announced for the start of 2025. Steak 'n Shake also changed some dairy inputs and added bottled Coca-Cola made with cane sugar, framing the decisions as quality-driven and consistent with the push for less-processed foods. In an annual letter to Biglari Holdings shareholders, owner Sardar Biglari called the chain’s 2025 performance “the biggest story of the year,” citing a rebuilt management team and a new mission. Biglari Holdings’ regulatory filing reported same-store sales up 10.2% in 2025, and the company said in an X post that same-store sales were up 15% year to date in 2026, though the comparison window was not specified.

Investor control, bitcoin promotions and rising input-cost risk

Steak 'n Shake has complemented food messaging with culture-war and crypto signals, including accepting bitcoin, offering customer rewards, and paying a small hourly “bitcoin bonus” to employees. It has also promoted perks aimed at Tesla owners and pledged $1,000 contributions to employees’ “Trump Accounts,” moves that analysts characterize as niche marketing rather than operational necessity. Third-party foot-traffic data from Placer.ai showed average visits per location rose 3.6% in 2025 versus the prior year, but remained 25.4% below 2019, a gap the firm linked to smaller-format restaurants designed for faster service. Restaurant analysts cautioned that the rebound is coming off a smaller footprint and that plans to move toward higher-quality beef could collide with a historically tight cattle market and elevated beef prices. Steak 'n Shake did not respond to requests for comment, Business Insider reported.

We previously reported on fresh volatility in US fuel markets as the Iran-related conflict pushed crude prices higher and lifted the risk of a fast move up in pump prices. That report flagged the Strait of Hormuz as a key supply-chain chokepoint and noted that higher gasoline and shipping costs can ripple into broader retail pricing and consumer spending.

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