Diversified Restaurant Group saves $1.1M a year across 181 Taco Bell locations
Customer overview
Diversified Restaurant Group got their start when their founders acquired 85 Taco Bell restaurants on the West Coast in 2014. Since then, DRG has grown to manage 300 Taco Bell and over 28 Arby's locations. At the forefront of innovation, DRG is consistently one of the first franchisees to test new concepts. In 2015, they opened the second Taco Bell Cantina in downtown San Francisco. In 2016, they built the highest volume Taco Bell in the system in Las Vegas.
For an operator at this scale, asset visibility and energy management are not nice-to-haves. They are the difference between a portfolio that runs efficiently and one that quietly leaks margin every month.
The challenge
DRG's portfolio combined two operational realities that compound at scale: a high site count where small per-site issues become big aggregate problems, and a California footprint where utility rates and energy regulation make every kilowatt count. The team needed visibility into how each location's HVAC was performing and a way to manage setpoints centrally instead of one thermostat at a time.
Working with GlacierGrid
DRG started with a nine-location pilot to validate the platform. The results justified the expansion, and DRG rolled GlacierGrid out across 160 locations in California, eventually reaching 181 sites.
The platform gave DRG a data-driven dashboard combining intelligent HVAC control with comprehensive monitoring tools across every location:
- Intelligent HVAC control for optimized energy use, with schedules and setpoints managed centrally.
- Temperature and humidity monitoring for refrigeration, so the team catches issues before they become food-safety incidents.
- Real-time insights that allow immediate adjustments instead of waiting for a monthly utility bill or a service complaint.
- Centralized control replacing manual thermostat management at every location.
The pilot-to-expansion pattern is the playbook for an operator at DRG's scale: prove the savings on a small set of sites, then ramp confidently to the full portfolio.
Results
Across the 181 GlacierGrid-equipped locations, DRG achieved:
- 8.83% energy savings versus baseline.
- $1.1M in annual savings flowing to the operator's P&L.
For a multi-unit franchisee operating in some of the highest energy-cost markets in the country, that level of savings is the kind of operational lever that compounds year over year.
Ready to see what your sites would save?
GlacierGrid offers a 90-day free pilot for multi-unit operators in QSR, c-store, retail, and gym verticals. Talk to our team about deploying intelligent HVAC control and refrigeration monitoring across your portfolio.