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On the Border has closed all of its company-owned restaurants just over a year after being acquired out of bankruptcy by Pappas Restaurants, leaving only five franchised US locations and one in South Korea still operating.
On the Border, the Dallas-founded Tex-Mex casual dining chain, has shut down all of its company-owned restaurants, ending service at roughly 27 locations after close of business on Friday, June 12. The closures leave just five franchised locations still operating in the United States- spread across South Dakota, Florida, Nevada, and California- along with at least one franchised location in South Korea. The move comes just over a year after the brand was acquired out of bankruptcy by Houston-based Pappas Restaurants, and follows what the company described as "a thorough evaluation of the business." OTB Hospitality, the entity managing the brand, said it is currently exploring "a range of strategic options" for On the Border's future, with further details expected in the coming weeks.
The scale of On the Border's decline over the past year and a half is striking. When Pappas acquired the brand out of bankruptcy in early 2025, the chain still had 80 restaurants- itself already a significant reduction from the 166 locations it operated at its peak in 2007. In the months that followed, the unit count continued to fall sharply. By the end of last year, the chain was down to 57 locations according to Technomic data. By the Friday of the closures, its website listed just 33 units before the final shutdowns took effect. The trajectory tells the story of a brand that has been in managed retreat for some time, with each round of closures failing to stabilise the business sufficiently to halt the next.
On the Border was founded in Dallas in 1982 and built its reputation on accessible Tex-Mex fare- fajitas, margaritas, and tableside guacamole becoming the cornerstones of a menu that resonated broadly with American casual dining customers. The brand's most significant growth chapter came after its 1994 acquisition by Brinker International, the parent company of Chili's, which expanded it aggressively through the late 1990s and early 2000s. By 2007, the chain had reached 166 locations- its high-water mark. It was subsequently sold to private equity firm Golden Gate Capital in 2010, then again to Atlanta-based investment firm Argonne Capital Group in 2014, beginning a period of ownership transitions that coincided with persistent sales pressure and mounting operational challenges.
On the Border's difficulties did not emerge suddenly. The brand began experiencing persistent sales declines as far back as 2008, a trajectory that the various ownership changes over the years never managed to reverse. The pace of deterioration accelerated sharply in more recent years- the chain closed a large number of locations in 2024 and 2025, and last year alone saw sales fall nearly 33% while its unit count was cut by 42%, according to Technomic. At the time of the final closures, On the Border ranked as the fifth-largest Mexican casual-dining chain in the United States by total sales, with revenues of $152 million- a figure that reflects how far the brand had fallen from its position as one of the category's defining names.
When Pappas Restaurants stepped in to acquire On the Border out of bankruptcy in early 2025, the Houston-based operator- which runs approximately 90 restaurants across brands including Pappasito's Cantina, Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen, and Pappas Bar-B-Q, primarily in Texas- expressed clear intentions to revitalise what remained of the chain. At the time of the acquisition, the company said it planned to modernise On the Border's restaurants and update both the menu and its underlying operations. Those plans have not translated into a turnaround, and Friday's mass closure represents the effective end of the company-owned restaurant business that Pappas inherited just over a year ago. The brand's statement acknowledged the difficulty of the decision while stopping short of elaborating on what went wrong.
Despite the closure of its corporate restaurant estate, On the Border has not been declared dead outright. OTB Hospitality's statement was careful to leave the door open, noting that the company is "evaluating the future of the On The Border brand and exploring a range of strategic options," with further information promised in the next few weeks. Whether that means a sale of the brand, a licensing arrangement, a franchise-only future, or something else entirely remains to be seen. The five remaining franchised US locations and the South Korean outpost will continue operating independently in the meantime. For a brand that opened its first restaurant in Dallas more than four decades ago and once anchored mall food courts and suburban strip centres across the country, the current moment represents a profound crossroads- one whose outcome will determine whether On the Border has a future at all.
