Australian restaurant chain Guzman y Gomez’s attempt to build a burrito empire in the Chicago area came to an abrupt halt Friday when the company closed all eight locations, including one in Chicago’s Bucktown neighborhood.
The fast-casual chain began selling burritos, margaritas, and nacho fries across Chicagoland in 2020, its first foray into the U.S. market. It eventually opened restaurants in Evanston, Schaumburg, Naperville, Crystal Lake and other suburbs. The Bucktown location at 1624 N. Damen Ave. opened in December 2025.
But sales were poor and didn’t justify keeping the restaurants open, co-CEO Steven Marks said during a Thursday earnings call with analysts and shareholders.
“This means ceasing to trade our restaurants from today and proceeding with an orderly wind up of our operations in the U.S.,” he said. “Notwithstanding the progress made by the team, the financial performance of the U.S. has simply not been acceptable.”
Guzman y Gomez helped bring Mexican food to Australia and remains popular throughout much of East Asia. It runs several hundred restaurants in Australia, Japan and Singapore, and will open another 32 restaurants in Australia this fiscal year, said Marks, who co-founded the chain in 2006.
Marks told analysts he spent the last three months in the U.S., trying to save the business, but the Chicago-area operations were troubled from the start.
“Starting with suburban drive-thrus has made it difficult to build brands in the U.S.,” he said. “Chicago has also been difficult. What is important is that we make changes when we need to.”
The shutdowns were unexpected.
Guzman y Gomez announced last month that it would soon open several new Chicagoland locations. The company planned to build a new restaurant at 844 S. Route 59 in Naperville’s Fox River Commons shopping center, its second Naperville location. It also planned to open in 2027 a location on the ground floor of 925 W. Belmont Ave., a mixed-use development under construction in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood.
“Both those sites will obviously not open,” Chief Financial Officer Erik Du Plessis told analysts. “We’re working with the parties involved in those sites to wrap up amicably.”
