Cava wants AI to help power its Mediterranean bowl empire

• Cava is embracing AI to predict orders, optimize labor, and personalize customer interactions.
• CEO Brett Schulman said the Mediterranean chain has entered its "decade of data transformation."
• Cava isn't the only slop bowl chain to enter its AI era: Chipotle and Sweetgreen are pivoting, too.

Cava doesn't merely want to sell you a Mediterranean slop bowl anymore. It wants to predict when you'll order it, optimize the labor used to make it, personalize the app that sells it to you, and maybe eventually know you want extra feta before you do.

On the company's earnings call on Tuesday, Cava executives framed the fast-casual chain less like a traditional restaurant company and more like a tech platform that happens to serve pomegranate-glazed salmon and harissa chicken.

CEO Brett Schulman said the company was laying the groundwork to become "a real-time AI-enabled business" as Cava builds out its internal data and commerce infrastructure.

The chain has unveiled two new systems this year — "Cava Core," its centralized data platform, and "Cava Current," a real-time operating platform now processing orders across restaurants.

Together, Schulman said on Tuesday, the systems will allow Cava to create "more meaningful, personalized experiences" for guests while helping stores "anticipate demand and better align staffing and preparation in real time."

In practice, that means AI-powered forecasting, predictive labor scheduling, inventory management, and personalized digital marketing — all aimed at making the healthy-bowl chain faster, more efficient, and more addictive, so guests keep coming back.

Restaurant chains are aggressively leaning into AI as the fast-casual category becomes more crowded and consumers grow more selective about where they spend money.

Cava reported 9.7% same-restaurant sales growth and 6.8% traffic growth in the first quarter, with executives saying the company's lower-income customer cohorts are outperforming other income brackets as broader restaurant traffic softens. Executives also repeatedly stressed that Cava has avoided aggressive discounting, opting instead to position itself as a value play with premium ingredients.

Technology — not hummus — increasingly appears to be central to the company's growth strategy.

Schulman described the effort as Cava "being on the precipice of a decade of data transformation," saying the goal over the coming years is to create a connected system that brings "data, applications, and intelligence together to power our business."

Importantly, he said the technology was meant to "enhance the human experience, not replace it."

The message from Cava's earnings call was clear: the chain is entering its AI era — and the Mediterranean restaurant isn't the only slop bowl provider to bet big on technology as fast-casual chains look for ways to run leaner, faster, and more consistently.

During its most recent earnings call, Chipotle highlighted its AI assistant "Ava Cado," which helps managers with hiring, scheduling, prep planning, and operational insights.

Earlier this month, Sweetgreen executives discussed using new data systems to reduce waste, optimize labor, and personalize digital marketing.

The same trend can be seen across the fast food and fast casual sectors, including chains like McDonald's and Burger King, as restaurant chains are increasingly pitching AI as the next major growth engine — not only for customer-facing chatbots and apps, but for the invisible operational work behind the counter.