BID TerminalOpen complete report
Research library Consumer

Back of Napkin

CAVA Group, Inc. CAVA

Three-pass checkedFresh as companies report

CAVA's same-restaurant sales went from 2.1% to 9.0% in a year, which is the rarest thing in restaurants: a comp that accelerates while the store count grows 20%.

The shares are down 27% from their high anyway, and at roughly 130 times next year's earnings the price still assumes this works for a decade.

CAVA · price with moving averages

Daily · 6MWeekly · 3Y
$21$56$91$126$161 Sep '23Apr '24Nov '24Jun '25Jan '26Aug '26 BID
EMAs82140

Source: market data.

The business

Counter-service Mediterranean food. A customer walks the line and watches a bowl or pita get built: grain base, braised lamb or harissa chicken, then whatever combination of dips, pickles and sauces they point at. It is the Chipotle assembly line with different spices, and it works for the same reason, which is that the labour is visible and the customization is free. 476 restaurants across 28 states and Washington DC. The company also sells its dips and spreads through grocery, which is small enough to be a rounding line.

Inside the complete Back of Napkin

  1. 01The business
  2. 02The numbers
  3. 03Management
  4. 04How it fails or surprises you
  5. 05The shape of the payoff
  6. 06Closing thoughts
  7. 07Methodology

Continue with CAVA

Get the complete Back of Napkin free.

Choose this as your free complete report. No card required.

Read the complete report

More company research

View all research
Wingstop Inc. WINGThey pay Michael Skipworth to grow adjusted profit and to open new restaurants, with nothing in the plan tied to the sales of the restaurants already open, which means he will keep the development machine at full speed through a demand slump, because franchisees fund the buildings and every opening pays the scoreboard twice. Proxy Report Wingstop Inc. WINGWingstop's franchise machine is still opening a restaurant nearly every day while the customers inside its existing restaurants quietly thin out. Moat Dive SharkNinja, Inc. SNSharkNinja's growth just reaccelerated to 22%, its fastest quarter since 2024, and the stock has responded by doubling off its April low to 38 times trailing earnings. Back of Napkin AutoZone, Inc. AZOAutoZone's operating income fell in two consecutive quarters and then grew 6.6%, while revenue growth sat perfectly still at roughly 8% throughout. Back of Napkin