Golden Arches to Global Empire: The Rise of America’s Fast Food Chains

Just how much larger can our fast food corporations grow? This question is on everyone's mind, especially in light of recent news stories like this one; McDonald's is planning to expand its fleet of fast food restaurants, undergoing a hiring process for nearly 400,000 individuals.

But fast food empires like McDonald's didn't begin overnight. Regardless of what business they're in, corporate stories are intricate and often begin from humble origins.

This is certainly true for the biggest fast-food chains in the country. Whether they’re new or old, they all have fascinating and unique origin stories. But one thing that they all have in common - America's fast food chains all started as a single restaurant with a founder, or founders, who had a vision.

With innovative business practices and menu offerings that resonated with the public, these eateries have grown to dominate the American fast-food industry. No matter how they first got off the ground, these chains are still going strong today.

This post was updated May 13th, 2025 to reflect recent news from these fast food giants.

McDonald's was founded as a barbecue drive-in by brothers Maurice and Richard McDonald, in San Bernardino, California, in 1940. In 1948, they briefly closed the restaurant and re-opened it with a new concept: serving a limited menu of just nine items, including a 15-cent hamburger, served quickly and efficiently using a standardized food preparation system.

In 1954, a milkshake machine salesman named Ray Kroc saw a franchise opportunity in the restaurant, so he became the franchise agent, eventually buying the business outright and taking it national.

In 1971, three partners named Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl, and Gordon Bowker (who met while they were students at the University of San Francisco) opened the first Starbucks in Seattle, selling high-quality coffee beans and equipment.

They didn't start selling actual beverages until employee Howard Schultz, who had learned about coffee culture while visiting Italy, suggested they add espresso drinks to the menu in 1982. Schultz bought the business outright in 1987 and turned it into a coffeehouse chain.

A 17-year-old college student named Fred DeLuca borrowed $1,000 from a family friend named Peter Buck in 1965 to open a sandwich shop in Bridgeport, CT. Called Pete's Super Submarines, it sold affordable, high-quality sandwiches.

The idea caught on once they had the format where all the ingredients were put right in front of the customer, who could watch their sandwich being made. They changed the name to Subway in 1968, and the duo started franchising in 1974.

Inspired by McDonald's success, James McLamore and David Edgerton opened a fast food restaurant called Insta-Burger King in 1954 in Miami. The use of a special Insta-Broiler oven, which allowed them to cook up to 400 patties per hour, and the 1957 invention of the Whopper rocketed the company to success.

By 1959 they'd changed their name to Burger King and were on their way to international stardom.

Taco Bell is actually named after its founder, Glen Bell. He opened his first taco stand, called Taco Tia, in San Bernardino, California, in 1951. After refining his business model, he opened the first Taco Bell in Downey, California, in 1962.

His menu of tacos, burritos, and other Tex-Mex foods was then still pretty novel, and that plus affordable prices let the shop quickly catch on in popularity, with franchising and nationwide expansion following soon after.

Wendy's is named after the daughter of its founder, Dave Thomas, who founded the restaurant in Columbus, Ohio, in 1969. The restaurant's fresh (never frozen) beef, square patties, and ability to customize as many patties per burger as you want helped it find quick success.

The addition of its signature Frosty and the first drive-thru window, which it pioneered in 1971, was also beneficial. Its iconic "Where's the Beef" ad campaign helped put it on the map in the 1980s.

Formerly Dunkin' Donuts, Dunkin' was founded by William Rosenberg in Quincy, Massachusetts, in 1950. Rosenberg's original concept was to deliver breakfast and lunch to local Boston-area workers, but once he realized that donuts and coffee were more popular than anything else he sold, he opened a doughnut and coffee shop called Open Kettle.

Focused on doughnuts and high-quality coffee, it was an immediate hit and began expanding rapidly shortly after he changed the name to Dunkin' Donuts.

While running a restaurant called Dwarf House in Hapeville, Georgia, S. Truett Cathy developed the recipe for a pressure-fried chicken sandwich that could be served quickly. In 1967, he decided to open a restaurant devoted exclusively to that sandwich, and the first Chick-fil-A opened in Atlanta's Greenbriar Mall.

Its friendly service and tasty chicken sandwiches quickly caught on, and the chain soon began to expand to other malls and later standalone restaurants.

Pizza wasn't very commonly found in Wichita, Kansas when young brothers Dan and Frank Carney borrowed $600 from their mother to open a pizza restaurant to cater to local Wichita State University students in 1958.

They named it Pizza Hut because the sign only had room for eight letters, and the concept immediately took off as local students and families discovered it. The first franchise opened the following year in Topeka.

"Colonel" Harland Sanders had plenty of professional failures under his belt by the time he started selling fried chicken from his roadside restaurant (which also had a motor court and gas station) during the Great Depression. Each batch took so long to cook, however, that guests got impatient, so he spent years perfecting a recipe (with 11 signature herbs and spices) that could be cooked in a then-new device called a pressure fryer.

In 1952, he began franchising his recipe and taking a cut of the profits, and every restaurant that served his recipe was renamed Kentucky Fried Chicken. He traveled the country to promote the brand and check product consistency, becoming a major celebrity in the process.

Sonic got its start as a root beer stand called Top Hat Drive-In, which was founded in Shawnee, Oklahoma, by Troy Smith in 1953. He quickly realized that customers really liked being served in their cars, so he installed a speaker for placing orders, pioneering the drive-in concept.

Seven years later, he partnered up with Charles Pappe and changed the name to Sonic Drive-In, to capitalize on the then-popular Space Age aesthetic. They added burgers, hot dogs, and drinks to the menu, and soon folks were driving in from miles around.

Back in 1960, Tom and James Monaghan bought a small pizza restaurant in Ypsilanti, Michigan, called DomiNick's. They renamed it Domino's Pizza in 1965, and in order to give the business a boost they started offering delivery in 30 minutes or less, which set them apart from the pack.

Insulated delivery bags and fast delivery (which introduced a lot of people to the concept of "ordering in" for dinner) quickly took off, and the concept grew rapidly.

Panera was founded in Kirkwood, Missouri, as the St. Louis Bread Company by Ken Rosenthal in 1987. In 1993, it was bought out by Au Bon Pain, who expanded the concept and renamed it Panera Bread in 1997.

The bakery-cafe concept, which focused on comfortable seating and freshly-baked bread, sandwiches, sandwiches, and soups, served as a draw for office workers who were looking for a lighter, healthier lunch than the typical fast food offerings, and the chain took off.

Inspired by the huge burritos he fell in love with in San Francisco's Mission District, Steve Ells opened the first Chipotle Mexican Grill in Denver, Colorado, in 1993. Chipotle focused on high-quality, fresh, sustainable, and ethically sourced ingredients, and customers were able to customize their own burritos, bowls, and tacos.

The concept was completely novel (especially when you realize that most people's only exposure to burritos before this was the skinny Taco Bell-style ones), and a focus on transparency, simplicity, and consistency helped it gain a loyal following and it expanded rapidly.

In 1972, a restaurateur named Al Copeland opened a fried chicken restaurant called Chicken on the Run in New Orleans, but it struggled financially. He rebranded it at Popeyes (named after the main character in the 1971 film "The French Connection," not, in fact, Popeye the Sailor Man – or so the story goes).

Copeland then introduced a spicy fried chicken and a menu of Cajun-inspired sides like red beans and rice that set it apart from competitors. It was a hit, and quickly expanded through franchising.

Brothers Forrest and Leroy Raffel ran a successful restaurant equipment business in Boardman Ohio, and in 1964 they realized that there was a gap in the market for a quick-service restaurant that wasn't focused on burgers.

They decided to serve roast beef sandwiches, and they named the restaurant Arby's, named after their own initials ("Raffel Brothers"). The first location had an upscale design and the roast beef was high-quality and freshly roasted. The concept was a huge hit.

Jack in the Box was founded in San Diego in 1951 by Robert O. Peterson, who had been operating a small chain of drive-in restaurants called Topsy's Drive-In. Realizing that customers were looking for more speed and efficiency, he opened up a hamburger stand focused on drive-through service via a two-way intercom ordering system, the first restaurant to do so.

The clown-themed design and the novel intercom system brought in plenty of business, and the chain expanded rapidly.

Back in 1940, John Fremont "J.F." McCullough and his son Alex developed a recipe for a soft, creamy ice cream that could be quickly dispensed from a machine instead of having to be scooped by hand. They called it soft serve, and in order to test its commercial potential they convinced a friend, named Sherb Noble, to serve it at an ice cream shop he owned.

It sold out almost instantly, so the trio decided to base a whole concept around it and opened the first Dairy Queen in Joliet, Illinois. A franchising model spread the soft serve gospel nationwide.

Using $311 in borrowed money and their own savings, husband and wife Carl Margaret Karcher opened a cart selling hot dogs and tamales in Los Angeles in 1941. It was a hit, and by 1945 they'd earned enough money to open a full-service restaurant in Anaheim, which they called Carl's Drive-In Barbecue.

In 1956, they opened two smaller concepts focused on charbroiled hamburgers, which they called Carl's Jr. They were hits, and they quickly expanded through franchising.

Husband and wife Mike and Marian Ilitch opened the first Little Caesars (called Little Caesars Pizza Treat) in 1959 in the Detroit suburb of Garden City. High-quality pizzas, affordable prices, and family-oriented service quickly led to local success.

In 1979, the company rolled out the "Pizza! Pizza!" slogan and ad campaign to promote a two-for-the-price-of-one pizza deal, and it helped the company become the household name it is today. If all this history has got you feeling nostalgic, these are fast food menu items we wish would come back.