Hi Everyone,
What a year. From the epic return of the Mexican Pizza, to throwing it back to the classic Enchirito, to serving tacos from the sky at our new Defy restaurant, it’s been inspiring to reflect on everything we’ve accomplished.
But as you all know, Taco Bell is about so much more. We’re committed to our People, our Food and our Planet and in our 60th year, we continued to use our spirit of Restless Creativity to disrupt conventions in ways that make a positive impact. Our commitments and values are what make us proud and hold us accountable to our most important audiences: our teams, our customers and the communities in which we serve. Thank you for all that you do, every day.
So here are my commitments for Taco Bell in 2023:
Advocating For Our Workforce
We’re furthering our commitment to redefine what it means to work in QSR, creating pathways to ownership, and helping our people pursue their passions.
We are creating pathways for ownership at Taco Bell, and that means we need to create equitable opportunities for more people to rise up through the ranks. We launched Taco Bell Business School in 2022 and will continue building momentum toward diversifying franchisee ownership through the Yum! Franchise Accelerator program next year.
In 2022, Taco Bell and the Taco Bell Foundation launched the Ambition Accelerator, a social impact program for young people funded by Yum! Brand’s Unlocking Opportunity Initiative. Following a pitch competition at Taco Bell HQ, the Taco Bell Foundation awarded Sparkle Whitaker $25,000 for her nonprofit: The Onyx Incubator. Keep an eye out for the 2023 application and we encourage all eligible team members to apply.
The Taco Bell Foundation is offering $10M in Live Más Scholarships in 2023– $3M more than 2022. Team members and fans looking to pursue their passions should apply by January 11, 2023.
We’re making Equity, Inclusion & Belonging (EI&B) part of the fabric of our business.
In 2021, we introduced our first-ever Chief EI&B Officer, KT Thornton, who continues to ensure our EI&B strategy is more than a pillar, and truly woven into the brand strategy.
Now, we are committing to creating a more diverse workforce, which is why by the end of 2025 we are striving to achieve gender parity and at a minimum, double the total of racially underrepresented talent by double.
We are also focused on increasing spending to 10% with diverse vendors and suppliers by the end of 2025.
We’ll lift up the voices of our employees so we can champion change and continue to make Taco Bell a great place to work.
We believe in the power of community, and we want to be good stewards to our neighbors. Next year, each of our five Business Employee Resource Groups at our headquarters will be given an extra $20K to coordinate a civic engagement opportunity that inspires them and benefits the local SoCal community.
Since launching in 2021, nearly 200 employees from our headquarters and 15 company-owned restaurant team members have participated in the Internal Incubator, a program for employees to make their voices heard on ways to address business challenges. Stay tuned in 2023 to hear about the top winning idea from this year’s event.
On The Menu
We put vegetarian offerings on the fast food map, and we’ll keep raising the bar even higher for plant-based craveability.
In 2022, Taco Bell's vegetarian options represented over 12% of sales. We tested a proprietary plant-based protein inspired by classic Taco Bell flavors in the Crispy Melt Taco, plus Beyond Carne Asada Steak, and even gave the Fiesta Veggie Burrito a permanent spot on the value menu.
We currently offer over 30 vegetarian ingredients certified by the American Vegetarian Association, which can be combined for nearly one million combinations. Many fans also hack our menu using vegan-certified ingredients, so…we’re listening! We’ll explore new ways to implement fan and employee feedback to serve up more vegetarian innovations next year.
Has your guacamole tasted extra delicious these days? Did you know it’s house-made daily? We will continue incorporating new, high quality ingredients into menu items in 2023, like we did in 2022 with our revamped guacamole.
We’re pushing the industry for a more responsible supply chain.
We’re progressing on our pledge to reduce antibiotics important to human medicine in our beef by 25% within our U.S. and Canada supply chains by 2025. We’ve made progress with about 15% of our raw beef supply being procured from reduced antibiotic sources, and we’re engaging with industry partners on best practices, like the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef and the International Consortium for Antimicrobial Stewardship in Agriculture.
Intentional Impact
We’ll keep serving millions, but we’ll be more mindful of what happens after the tacos and Baja Blasts are devoured.
From our Quesadilla bags to our Chalupa wraps, we’re transitioning our consumer packaging suite to options that are more recycle-ready, while adding more recycling infrastructure to our restaurants, making it easier for responsible disposal after a delicious meal.
We’ll continue our mail-in sauce packet collection program with our partner TerraCycle®. This year, we expanded our efforts to accept any and all brands of single-use sauce packets and have collected more than 178,000 packets to date.
We’ll continue to be restlessly creative, push the status quo and rethink the way things can be.
Next year, we’ll aim to make our headquarters more sustainable, enacting shifts like improved energy efficiency and waste reduction. We’ll take lessons learned from headquarters to implement bold operational shifts in-restaurant.
If I’ve learned anything this year, it’s that good ideas come from anywhere. You, our team members, often are the source of the most innovative, ground-breaking thinking. So now I’ll close with a challenge for you to consider: how will you make 2023 the most creative year yet?
Cheers, Mark King
About Taco Bell Corp.
For more than 61 years, Bell has brought innovative, craveable Mexican-inspired food to the masses, and was recently recognized as one of TIME’s Most Influential Companies, one of Fast Company’s World’s Most Innovative Companies and Nation’s Restaurant News’ Brand Icon. For more information about Taco Bell, visit our website at www.TacoBell.com, our Newsroom at www.TacoBell.com/newsroom, or check out www.TacoBell.com/popular-links. You can also stay up to date on all things Taco Bell by following us on LinkedIn, TikTok, X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, Facebook and by subscribing to our YouTube channel.