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There’s been some industry chatter lately of “getting to the other side.” Hold fort on price, as much as possible, and withstand soft traffic until consumer confidence rebounds on the downslope of inflation. It’s not an unfamiliar story. A&W has been around 105 years and navigated two pandemics, the Great Depression and Recession, and countless economic and societal twists along the way.

Yet a more recent reality (relatively speaking), CEO Kevin Bazner says, allowed it to rise above the present climate. In 2011—13 years ago might be a long stretch for some, but it’s a blip for A&W—a core group of franchisees purchased the brand nine years after Yum! acquired it along with Long John Silver’s. Bazner, a A&W pillar from 1985–2022, was asked to return.