Texas Roadhouse Owns This Fast-Casual Restaurant Chain You Should Know More About

Move over, Texas Roadhouse, there's a new kid in town. The iconic steakhouse is riding high as America's favorite chain, but that hasn't stopped it from looking further for its next culinary conquest. Enter Jaggers, a fast-casual restaurant chain that's tipped for success. Jaggers is the brainchild of Texas Roadhouse's late CEO Kent Taylor, who brought his decades of restaurant industry experience to the fore when he spearheaded his new concept. Taylor, who died in 2021, set the wheels in motion for Jaggers before his death, and in the years since his passing it's started to blossom into something really special.

However, Jaggers is still in its infancy, and so we wouldn't blame you for not quite knowing what it is yet. There's also a high possibility that you've never seen a Jaggers near you, given that it's a relatively small chain at the moment. Well, make no mistake: This restaurant is one with big ambitions, and pretty soon, everyone will want to know what the deal is. We're getting ahead of the pack by breaking down exactly what you need to understand about Jaggers, and why you might be dining at one very soon.

Jaggers feels like the kind of restaurant that might have been knocking around for a while, given its classic menu options and Americana-inflected design. However, it's a relatively recent chain. The Jaggers concept was created in 2014 by Texas Roadhouse CEO Kent Taylor, who decided that he wanted to take a crack at the fast-casual market that's so dominated by places like McDonald's and Burger King, but do so in a slightly classier way. The chain was born in Indianapolis, with Taylor making the city its epicenter so that he could drive to it from his home in Louisville, Kentucky. Why not put it in Louisville, you ask? Well, Taylor didn't want it to be too close: He didn't want to hear about it nonstop if it was a dud. Makes sense.

So where does that distinctive name come from? Turns out that it's British slang, albeit a type that's not very commonly used. "Jagger" is another word for a hawker, but it's also used to indicate someone with an entrepreneurial spirit. Taylor gave the restaurant the name in honor of his self-made uncle Bill Taylor. We know you were thinking it was named after Mick Jagger, but that's not the case.

Unlike other fast food restaurants, Jaggers doesn't seek to reinvent the wheel. However, it does try to do things in a slightly better way than its competitors. Late CEO Kent Taylor sought to make Jaggers a cut above the rest, by combining the vibe of a few other famous chains. Taylor explained his thinking in a profile published in Louisville Business First. "I've always been impressed with Chick-fil-A, and maybe not as impressed with Burger King or Wendy's," he said to the publication. "I also really liked the burgers at Five Guys, so I thought, 'What if Chick-fil-A and Five Guys got married and had a kid? What would it look like?'"

What this means in practice is that Jaggers is well-versed both in burgers and chicken sandwiches. On the burger side you can get heaping double-patty buns, topped with cheese, ham, and even a fried egg. Its fast food chicken sandwiches, meanwhile, are hand-breaded for maximum crispiness (oh, and they come with an egg too, if you're so inclined). The restaurant also sells an assortment of other sandwiches, salads, and milkshakes.

Jaggers tries to buck the trend when it comes to fast-casual concepts, which tend to put speed at the expense of individuality. Instead, it proudly hand-makes its food. Jaggers menu items are made from scratch daily, with ingredients sourced with quality and authenticity in mind. Everything from its chicken tenders to its mac and cheese (just one of a range of impressive sides, which also include edamame beans), are built and cooked in-store. Not bad for a fast food joint, huh?

This scratch-made approach seems to be paying off, too. Jaggers' Indianapolis branch boasts positive reviews that are kinda unheard of for a fast-casual chain, which tend to get criticized for the quality of food. "Fresh. Great menu. All of it is so fresh," said one reviewer over on Yelp. Another person raved that, "The chicken strips were breaded nicely and the meat tender & tasty. The shoestring fries were seasoned well & hot. The sweet tea was good as well." That sounds like a winner to us!

Jaggers may be a fast-casual chain, but that doesn't mean you have to be in and out of the door. Instead, the restaurant prides itself on trying to make you feel at home, and that you're enjoying good times. Jaggers creates a lively vibe, in which you can choose from booth or high-top table seating. It's the kind of place that caters to all ages. Plus, it puts a big emphasis on the quality of its service, which makes you feel super welcome.

All of this is contributed to, rather strangely, by the presence of TVs. Television sets line the walls of each Jaggers, which might sound like an unusual move, but which sort of gives each one the feel of a lived-in neighborhood sports bar. Rather than creating a clinical atmosphere where you have to be in and out in a flash, the TVs invite you to sit back, relax, stay a while, and enjoy some delicious food.

Everyone knows how difficult it is to find a good fast food salad. You either get a boring little pile of leaves and grape tomatoes in a plastic tray, or you end up with a heaping pile of fried chicken tenders, cheese, and lettuce that's somehow billing itself as healthy. Well, this isn't the case at Jaggers. The chain works hard to make its salads the best they can be, with its freshly prepared options taking way more effort but resulting in a lot more flavor and wholesomeness.

It might sound wild for salads to be the stand-out thing on a menu that also bills burgers and chicken sandwiches as the stars of the show, but somehow Jaggers has nailed it. It's won praise for its salads from customers, with one person on Facebook stating that, "The Jagger chicken salad [is] sooo delicious." Even the side salad seems to be a winner, with people noting how fresh the vegetables are. If you're looking for a change from limp, depressing salads, Jaggers is the place for you.

We think Jaggers may be making a big splash in the next few years. However, as of right now, you'll only find it in certain states. Jaggers' home is in Indiana, and its Indianapolis restaurant is very much still alive and kicking. Located on East 82nd Street, it's open seven days a week, and it's the best place to go if you want to feel the Jaggers vibe in its purest form.

That said, there are a few other locations dotted around the country. The Louisville, Kentucky Jaggers is just down the road, and is built in the home town of ex-CEO Kent Taylor (presumably once he figured out that it wasn't gonna be a bust). Further down to the south west is the Jaggers restaurant in Longview, Texas. If you're in North Carolina, though, you've got a couple of other opportunities to try its food, given Jaggers' prominence in the state. There are three Jaggers restaurants across North Carolina, with a fourth planned Raleigh. We wouldn't be surprised if there are plans to expand further in this area.

Although fast-casual restaurants appear to spring out of nowhere to dominate the whole market, the reality is that they often take a bit of time to get off the ground. The same is true for Jaggers, which took a relatively relaxed approach to growth in its first few years. Jaggers launched in 2014, and by 2020 it had only gained an additional restaurant, to total two. Clearly, things didn't exactly get off to a speedy start, and you'd be forgiven for thinking that the impact of COVID-19 stopped it in its tracks.

However, that wasn't the case — and instead, Jaggers began to flourish in those post-2020 years. By the end of 2023 it had eight locations dotted across several states. By the end of 2024 it had gained an additional restaurant, which was opened all the way over in South Korea (which already had Popeyes) on a United States military base, as part of its international franchising efforts. It's been a slow climb, but it seems like the restaurant is picking up momentum.

Jaggers has been biding its time for a while now, but it seems like 2025 is the year things are really ramping up for the brand. In August of that year, Texas Roadhouse announced that the next 12 months would be big for Jaggers, as well as for its sister brand Bubba's 33 (and we'd imagine for Texas Roadhouse, too). The company plans to open eight new Jaggers restaurants in 2026, a marked increase of its numbers, and it looks as though it's planning to keep the pace up for the coming few years.

A big part of how it'll do that is through its franchising. Jaggers is prominently seeking franchisees through its website, where it states that it's open to both domestic and international opportunities. It also says pretty explicitly that it's looking for partners that can develop territories. Clearly it's got world domination in its sights. We're kinda here for it.