CMGChipotle Mexican Grill, Inc.
AI adoption · Q1 2026 earnings call
Consumer DiscretionaryScaling
3
extracted from this call
3 / 5
operational, no hard numbers
Not disclosed
no breakout in this call
Chipotle discussed AI primarily through its 'Ava' (Avocado) AI assistant, which is deployed in restaurants to streamline hiring and provide operational support to general managers. Management announced an expansion of Ava's capabilities to include scheduling, treat planning, and facilities triage, with full stage-gate completion anticipated by year-end 2026. AI was framed as one component of a broader technology modernization pillar within the company's Recipe for Growth strategy, with no financial quantification of AI-related costs or revenue impact provided.
Adopter
See full leaderboard →37/ 100
76
stage: scaling · max spec: 3
0
no quantified disclosure
35
1 scope
internal_use
3 AI mentions from this call.
Extracted verbatim from the CMG Q1 2026 earnings call transcript. Speaker, section, and specificity tier surfaced for each mention.
- T3Prepared remarks· CEO· Internal use
“leveraging AI and our restaurants to further support our teams. Avocado, our AI assistant continues to deliver real benefits by streamlining hiring and freeing up more time for our managers. Now we are expanding [ AVA's ] capabilities to assist our general managers with operational insights, scheduling treat planning and [indiscernible] guidance. We are also enhancing our facilities capabilities to triage equipment issues more quickly, reducing [ down ] on and improving restaurant performance. These enhanced capabilities received a standing ovation in our all managers conference and we anticipate having them in stage gate at the end of the year.”
— Scott Boatwright, CMG earnings callAvocado, Ava - T3Q&A· CEO· Internal useI'm just curious, following up to Greg's question around value perception in the marketplace... wondering if that's an area you're exploring for an opportunity to improve the value scores.
“Other initiatives like the Chipotle Kitchen, things like the GM Assistant, avocado on the hiring side, all those hours are freeing up the manager and freeing up the team to be more efficient and deliver a better team member experience, which always ladders to a better guest experience. And we are reinvesting that time back into the business and not taking it out to further bolster the consumer experience”
— Scott Boatwright, CMG earnings callChipotle Kitchen, GM Assistant, Avocado - T1Prepared remarks· CEO· Internal use
“modernizing our business model with industry-leading technology, including leveraging AI and relaunching our rewards program to elevate the experience for our guests and our teams”
— Scott Boatwright, CMG earnings callrewards program
What management wouldn’t quantify.
Analyst questions where management declined to share a specific number. The pattern of refusals is often as informative as the disclosures.
- No quantification of cost savings or productivity gains attributable to the Ava AI assistant.
- No disclosure of investment levels (capex or opex) specifically allocated to AI development or deployment.
- No detail on the number of restaurants currently using Ava for hiring versus the expanded operational capabilities.
- No timeline or financial targets associated with AI-driven outcomes.
- Management did not address AI competitive risk or the use of third-party AI models/platforms.
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