My Small Role in the History of Qdoba

One of the happiest days of my life was when Qdoba opened a location in Saginaw. Prior to that, I would make the drive to the Miller Road exit in Flint to get my Qdoba fix. Over the past few years, Qdoba has really grown a lot. I think there are close to 500 locations in the US and most people are familiar with the chain.

What most people don't realize is that Qdoba started out in Denver in 1995 and my first apartment in Denver was only a few blocks from their second location (and just about one mile from the first location). When I first visited Denver to search for an apartment, it was the first restaurant my friends took me to. At the time it was called Zuma, but it was pretty much the same as the Qdoba restaurants of today (minus some of the newer chainwide decor).

For my ten years in Denver, Qdoba was a staple of my diet. In total candor, I did also eat at Qdoba rival Chipotle (chip-ot-lay, not chip-ol-tee) which was founded two years earlier in--you guessed it--Denver. Even with my occasional trip to Chipotle, I was mostly very loyal to Qdoba.

In the late 90's, they had changed the name from Zuma to Z-Teca. I have to be honest, as far as branding goes, I've never loved their naming decisions. It just seemed like they were trying to confound people (and based on the comments from friends/acquaintences, they were doing just that).

Anyway, around the time of the name change (1998, maybe?) I was lucky enough to actually have a small (very small) role in the early growth of the chain. I was hired by the Z-Teca corporate offices as a freelance designer. I can remember the chain growing from a handful of stores (at the time, I think they had around 10 locations). They had done some work with an ad agency who provided some guidelines, but brought me in to work on a variety of things—mailings, coupons, menus, postcards, and so forth. We kept tweaking the pieces until we finally came upon a look we were happy with. For a while it seemed like I was doing a few grand opening postcards and menus every single week. Locations throughout Colorado and then into Texas, I think. Z-Teca was strictly a franchise operation then (I think that Qdoba now has some corporate money from Jack in the Box) so you would had individual locations springing up here and there throughout the country.

It was a really exciting time to be involved with the chain because you knew that it was going to blow up. I like the feeling of getting involved on the ground floor of something. That's one of the best aspects of this gig—you get to meet a lot of people and work with them to help bring their dreams to life. In the case of Qdoba, they were going to be huge no matter what I did. I am proud of the work I did with them, but their success had nothing to do with my work (I could have put swastikas on their menu and I don't think it would have made a bit of difference). I think what I love about it is the energy that a new product/restaurant/etc. has surrounding it. It's all about hope and promise and possibility—that's the sort of environment when I feel like I do my best work.

After about a year or so, the growth was so great that they brought in a professional restaurant marketing guru who had her own team of designers. I was disappointed that I wouldn't be working with them anymore, but I was grateful for having had the opportunity.

Thanks for everything, Qdoba.