John Peyton has spent most of his career welcoming people into places that aren’t quite home, but aren’t quite public either.
Hotels, resorts, real estate brands, corporate portfolios with long histories and big footprints. When he became CEO of Dine Brands in January 2021, he didn’t frame it as a pivot so much as a return.
“Restaurants are certainly a close cousin of hotels,” Peyton says. “It was a return to hospitality, and I loved the business of hospitality because in that regard, hotels and restaurants are very much the same. We’re welcoming people into our space for an hour or in a hotel a day or a week, and we’re there to provide a great experience and great service.”
Peyton joined Dine in the middle of COVID chaos, when restaurants weren’t just struggling, they were literally shut down, and so were the corporate offices. The CEO doesn’t mean to sound flip, but he knew at the time that matters couldn’t get any worse—they can only get better. These early trials and tribulations shaped the way he talks about the company now.
Dine is a franchisor with iconic names, a national footprint, and a customer base that behaves like a country of its own. Peyton says IHOP and Applebee’s appeal to everyone, so much so that 200 million Americans are served by the two chains each year. IHOP and Applebee’s are the second-largest and third-largest casual-dining chains in the U.S. in terms of unit count, ending Q3 with 1,670 and 1,465 stores, respectively (Waffle House is the largest with over 1,900 restaurants nationwide).
The question facing Dine in 2026 and beyond is not whether people know Applebee’s, IHOP, or even the newer Fuzzy’s Taco Shop. The question is whether the company can make those brands feel newly useful in a dining economy that has changed the rules on value, loyalty, and what counts as a good night out.
The restaurant group’s answer is straightforward and a little audacious. Fix the experience. Make value feel complete, not cheap. Use marketing like a live wire instead of a megaphone. Build an operating model that can move faster without breaking. And take its two biggest names, Applebee’s and IHOP, and put them under the same roof in a way Peyton calls “truly unique in this category.”
“Americans and particularly the guests of Applebee’s and IHOP are certainly feeling economic pressure and are watching their wallets and they’re making very informed and choiceful decisions about when and where they spend their discretionary income, and so we’re in a very competitive marketplace right now where value matters,” Peyton says.
The New Value Equation
To understand where Dine is headed, one must start with how its leaders describe the customer. Peyton says the post-COVID era came in phases. First, convince people it was safe to return. Then inflation arrived and rewired dining behavior in a deeper way.
Value, in Peyton’s view, did not just intensify. It evolved.
“The definition of value has expanded and has changed over the last couple of years,” he says. “For many, many years, Applebee’s promotions more often than not tended to be some version of a promotion of an appetizer.”
That playbook worked until guests began demanding predictability. Customers wanted to know the full cost, which has led to a rise in structured value meals. One of the most obvious ones is McDonald’s $5 Meal Deal. Applebee’s has its own 2 for $25 offering (two entrées and one appetizer) and last year launched a $9.99 Really BIG Meal Deal. IHOP introduced a value-based House Faves menu in 2024, and that evolved into an everyday option starting last fall.
But, when Dine talks to guests now, the word they hear isn’t only price. It is the atmosphere. If people are going to spend, they want the whole experience to justify it.
“They want it to be great food, abundant, great quality,” Peyton says. “… And now they’re very much focused on the experience and the condition of the restaurant—that it’s clean and current and contemporary as well as the service that they receive is equally important.”
Like Peyton, Applebee’s CMO Michelle Chin defines value in two parts. The first is product and price, led by the aforementioned 2 for $25 offering, which she describes as a complete meal for two individuals to come together. The second piece is experience. The brand wants to offer customers reasonable value to draw them in, and leverage the dining room ambiance to keep them coming back.
Chin, who came onboard in September, was happy to learn that the chain’s tagline, “Eating Good in the Neighborhood” has been around for 25 years and that it’s still resonating with existing and new consumers.
For the marketing executive, the trick is honoring that core idea while updating what “neighborhood” means. Although Applebee’s has stuck to that community theme, the concept has unquestionably modernized. “Neighborhood” could be online. After all, the chain’s off-premises channel mixed 22.9 percent in Q3 (11.7 percent to-go and 11.1 percent delivery), far higher than the brand ever reached before the pandemic.
Chin leans hard into the idea of Applebee’s as a place for people to be with each other, even if the “neighborhood” is less about geography and more about belonging.
“It’s really about being a connector, being a catalyst,” she says.
Applebee’s Remodels Dining Room and Menus
Dine and its Applebee’s franchisees are putting forth the cash to improve the atmosphere.
The chain is in the middle of a three-year reimage program, and Peyton talks about it with the detail of someone who knows what a tired exterior says to a passing driver. The “Looking Good” remodel program includes exterior and interior enhancements. More specifically, restaurants will see new signage, lighting, graphics, awnings, artwork, fixtures, repainting and refinishing. Post-renovation, stores are seeing sales lifts between 5 and 15-plus percent. As of Q3, 80 units were remodeled. The goal is to finish 50 percent of the portfolio by the end of 2027.
The remodel work is paired with consistent menu cadence. During the Q3 earnings call with investors, Peyton said Applebee’s would sustain a pipeline “with a new appetizer and a new entrée added to our menu each quarter.” In Q3, the brand launched Chicken Parmesan Fettuccine, which became the brand’s best-selling standalone pasta dish, representing about 13 percent of transactions.
Peyton also pointed to the momentum around the Ultimate Trio sampler, allowing guests to pick three appetizers plus sauces. The product is tied to Applebee’s NFL partnership and offers over 80,000 flavor combinations. The CEO said this highlights “the power of choice that younger guests love without adding more SKUs or complexity to the kitchen.”
Chin speaks about innovation not as a departure from value, but as the reason value doesn’t become a trap. She doesn’t want Applebee’s to train guests to only show up for a deal. Her answer is to keep the menu moving in ways that feel fun and a little outrageous.
“We have a grilled cheese cheeseburger that’s out on our menus that guests love,” Chin says. “It’s taken the guests by storm because when it comes down to it, it’s two American favorites slammed together.”
Applebee’s started the new year with a bang by launching the O-M-Cheeseburger, which is the brand’s bacon cheeseburger cut in half, placed onto a hot skillet over sizzling queso.
Chin believes Applebee’s can make these moments work because marketing and culinary are built to collaborate.
“I very much believe in integrated marketing,” she says. “The culinary team reports into my organization and so we work hand in hand together.”
IHOP Brings More Magic
IHOP president Lawrence Kim talks about the breakfast giant the way someone talks about a hometown that still feels like home even when it has changed. He came to Dine from Yum Brands!, with a decade-plus in the industry, and he says what convinced him to join the company was not a slide deck. It was the people.
“I was traveling all over the country and I would stop by IHOPs, and I would meet with guests,” Kim says. “Every time I spoke with a guest, they would tell me how much they loved IHOP.”
Then he noticed something that can’t be faked with marketing. Many of the employees said they’ve been with the same restaurant for over 20 to 30 years. Kim says that love and attraction to the brand is infectious. Every location he visited, he felt magic.
“IHOP is a 67-year-old brand, but what attracted me is I really felt that IHOP is a 67 year young brand,” Kim says.
On the business side, Kim’s first major storyline has been value. When he joined, IHOP was preparing to launch its weekday $6 House Faves platform. The goal was to fix perception. Kim admits that before 2024, IHOP and value association weren’t the strongest. The chain’s new strategy was to go loud and shout “from the mountaintops.”
The results, he says, showed up in traffic and relative performance. IHOP outperformed Black Box Intelligence traffic every month of 2025, through at least the third quarter. In fact, Q3 was the chain’s first quarter of positive traffic in several years.
The bigger shift happened when guests began asking for the value menu on weekends. So IHOP adjusted. In September, it relaunched the value platform to be every day at the same $6 price point.
Dine positions it as a foundational move, not a temporary promotional spike. On the Q3 earnings call, Peyton coined the everyday value menu as “one of the largest launches in the brand’s history,” and emphasized that it was “designed and tested to be profitable.”
Still, the old fear remains. If you go too hard on value, you can drag check down. Kim says IHOP is managing that balance deliberately. When the brand first rolled out House Faves, value incidence was around 25 percent; as of Q3, it was approximately 15 percent, proving that guests aren’t just coming in for discounts. IHOP deploys a barbell strategy—using upsells, premium offerings, and merchandising to pair with value.
Alongside the menu, Kim says IHOP works at “the speed of culture” to create true engagement and build authentic bonds with customers.
He is not shy about big swings. IHOP has leaned into cultural stunts like Guinness World Records moments (most pancakes served in an eight-hour period) and experimental LTOs, like the Dubai Chocolate Pancake launch—a moment, rather than just a menu drop.
Another internet-ready promotion came in January. Kim and IHOP are very much aware of the 24-hour fantasy football punishment in which a last place finisher must spend 24 hours in an IHOP. Time spent in the restaurant is reduced by every pancake eaten. IHOP decided to flip the script by partnering with Malik Nabers of the NFL’s New York Giants to offer free bottomless pancakes.
“Pancakes shouldn’t be about punishment, especially our pancakes. They’re world-class. They’re awesome,” Kim says.
As more guests enter IHOP, they’re met with streamlined operations. For instance, in 2024, the brand had 26 LTOs. Last year, there were only six. The impact is measurable; speed improved by over six minutes and accuracy rose over 10 percent.
Speed is part of the promise for families who walk in hungry.
“I have two young kids,” Kim says. “Nobody wants to wait for their food for 20 minutes because then your kids get hungry.”
Fuzzy’s Comes Along
Applebee’s and IHOP are the gravitational centers of Dine. Fuzzy’s is the test of whether the company’s platform can do more than just maintain two giants. Peyton sees the acquisition—which was first announced in December 2022—as both strategic diversification and a demonstration that the restaurant group can insert a smaller brand into its infrastructure. He adds that Applebee’s, IHOP, and Fuzzy’s are on the same platform where it’s common behind the scenes but it goes to market as red, blue, or green.
“We believe in the power of our platform,” he says. “We’ve built a technology stack… and so we can now plug additional brands into that structure.”
Fuzzy’s was attractive for category reasons, too. Dine was intrigued by fast casual and the fast-growing Mexican and taco segments. But Peyton is candid that the brand needed work. The menu has been streamlined and the quality of the tacos and proteins have been upgraded, he says.
The most intriguing test, according to Peyton, is Fuzzy’s “fast casual plus” prototype. At the typical restaurant, customers order at the counter, pay for the meal, and receive a buzzer when the food is ready. With the new update, the store looks more like a sports bar with TVs everywhere. Employees bring guests to their table and later their food.
The aim is not just hospitality for its own sake, but a higher check and a longer stay.
“That’s already showing us that we’re getting second orders of drinks or tacos,” he says.
He says 2026 is “the test for us,” with franchisees already developing new 2.0 locations.
In Q3, Fuzzy’s experienced modest improvements across sales and traffic. The chain finished the quarter with 109 restaurants systemwide.
Bold Co-Branded Play
Dine has multiple levers it is pulling at once. Remodels. Menu innovation. Value platforms. Operational simplification. Digital engagement. Fuzzy’s repositioning.
Still, the company believes the most powerful growth lever is also the most visible. Put Applebee’s and IHOP together as co-branded concept.
Peyton calls it “a big, potentially game-changing, idea” and he’s felt that way since visiting one in Mexico two years ago. He argues it works because it is not a marriage of two brands fighting for the same daypart.
“Only Dine Brands has a premier AM brand and a premier PM brand,” he says. “Putting complementary dayparts under the same roof.”
The CEO says it’s a victory on multiple levels. It’s a win for franchisees because they’re adding 1.5 to 2.5 times the revenue to their existing restaurant when they add the second brand. It’s a win for guests because they continually tell Dine they love the flexibility of ordering ribs, omelet, and burgers at the same time. And it’s a win for Dine because it’s accelerating unit growth and providing more royalty revenue.
The co-branded prototype began internationally and has done well overseas. The early U.S. performance has been compelling as well. The first domestic iteration opened in February 2025 in Seguin, Texas, and it’s now doing two times the revenue it did as just an IHOP.
Inside, the aesthetics and seating for each brand are represented in different sections, one being Applebee’s red and the other being IHOP’s blue. Customers can choose to sit on either side and are presented with one menu organized by daypart that has been simplified to include the best of both brands. There is one kitchen, POS, a cross-trained staff, and the same number of items as a single-branded restaurant. Peyton says the operational structure helps the team “focus on our guests and ensure they have a great experience.”
The sales mix, he says, reinforces the complementary daypart thesis. For each daypart, the off brand represents at least 15 percent of sales. This means Applebee’s sells in the morning and IHOP sells at night in meaningful ways.
Dine is also telling franchisees the economics are getting better as the process becomes standardized. The company expects a payback period of less than three years and four-wall margins are almost doubling.
Most of the dual-branded restaurants being built so far are conversions—more so Applebee’s being tacked onto IHOPs. And there’s logic behind that.
“IHOP is currently open for dinner. And dinner has always been a challenge for that brand. So to add an Applebee’s solves an existing challenge for that brand,” Peyton told analysts during Dine’s Q3 earnings call.
Dine finished 2025 with about 30 co-branded restaurants internationally and 30 domestically. In 2026, it expects to debut at least 50 within the U.S. and about 40 more across the world.
According to the restaurant group, there is room for 900 dual-branded stores in the U.S. Half of those opportunities are new builds in markets where there is no Applebee’s or IHOP. The other half are existing Applebee’s or IHOPs that could take on a second brand without conflicting with the territory of an existing restaurant nearby.
One reason the co-branded strategy matters so much is that it sits alongside three other development plays.
IHOP, Peyton says, is already a durable development engine. For the past several years, the chain has opened roughly 40 units annually. To Peyton, “that’s extraordinary for a brand of its age.” He also notes that 90 percent of those openings are existing operators and 80 percent are conversion opportunities.
He acknowledges, however, that Applebee’s development has slowed because of tougher unit economics. The cost to build became too expensive relative to the return. The response is a new, lower-cost prototype that removes a third of the cost. Dine will build one in 2026 to showcase the better financial figures to franchisees.
Then there is Fuzzy’s, the fourth lane.
“Our strategy is to have the right product in the right market for the right franchisee,” Peyton says.
Where Dine Brands is Headed
The simplest version of Dine’s future is this: a company trying to make two legacy brands feel fresh and dependable at the same time, while building a new kind of growth machine around them.
Peyton says the company is leaving 2025 with momentum. Applebee’s posted positive same-store sales in Q3 for the first time in years. IHOP’s traffic is on a similar track.
He insists it did not happen accidentally.
“It happened because of our relevant value strategies,” he says. “It happened because we’ve fine-tuned the marketing both in the content and the way in which we reach our guests.”
Chin describes Applebee’s future as a continuity story, not a reinvention fantasy.
“This year we celebrated our 45th anniversary,” she says. “How are we going to celebrate the next 45 years?”
Meanwhile, Kim says IHOP is “laser-focused” on driving profitable growth and “working at the speed of culture.”
Peyton, who came from hospitality where a refreshed lobby can change how a guest feels before they even see their room, keeps bringing the strategy back to what makes people choose one place over another.
“The definition of value is the full cost of the meal as well as the vibe in the restaurant,” he says.
“We’re keeping an eye on the state of mind of the guests because it’s a battle for market share right now.”
And Dine is acting like it intends to win it.
