Alsea Boston Consulting Group Matrix

Domino's Pizza in Mexico is a significant growth engine for Alsea, demonstrating impressive financial health. In the second quarter of 2025, the brand achieved a strong 8.9% same-store sales growth, underscoring its popularity and market penetration.

Alsea's strategic focus on Domino's for new unit expansion, alongside Starbucks, highlights its position as a highly profitable brand within the portfolio. This emphasis suggests Domino's holds a substantial and growing share in Mexico's quick-service restaurant market.

Starbucks in Mexico and Domino's Pizza in both Mexico and Colombia are prime examples of Stars within Alsea's portfolio. These brands exhibit strong same-store sales growth, with Starbucks Mexico showing 8.7% in Q2 2024 and Domino's Colombia achieving 10.8% in Q2 2025. Their significant market share and Alsea's strategic expansion plans, like investing $12 million in 30 new Starbucks in Colombia, solidify their status as high-growth, high-market-share entities. The overall growth in Latin America's quick-service restaurant sector further bolsters their potential.

Starbucks in Spain and Portugal represents a stable, mature market for Alsea. Despite broader European segment challenges, these operations contribute meaningfully to overall European revenue, highlighting their established position.

The coffee shop sector in Europe saw 2.5% same-store sales growth in Q2 2025. This suggests a steady, mature market where Starbucks in Spain and Portugal likely benefits from a high market share, requiring minimal aggressive investment for expansion, characteristic of a Cash Cow.

Alsea's Cash Cows are its mature, high-market-share brands that generate significant, stable cash flow with minimal investment. These businesses, like Vips and Chili's in Mexico, and Starbucks in Spain and Portugal, represent the backbone of Alsea's financial stability.

These operations consistently contribute to Alsea's revenue, allowing the company to fund investments in other, more dynamic parts of its portfolio. For instance, Mexico, Alsea's foundational market, accounted for 54.6% of consolidated sales in Q2 2025, with sales growth reaching 9.1% in the same period.

Domino's Pizza in Spain is another key Cash Cow, showing 1.9% same-store sales growth in Q2 2025, demonstrating its reliable cash generation despite more modest growth rates.

Burger King in markets like Argentina, Chile, and Colombia also functions as a Cash Cow, benefiting from strong brand recognition and Alsea's operational efficiencies to provide consistent cash flow.

Alsea's operations in Argentina are currently navigating a difficult economic landscape characterized by peso depreciation and a slowdown in consumer spending. These headwinds have created a challenging market environment.

The impact of these conditions is evident in Alsea's performance. Excluding Argentina, Coffee Shops experienced a 6.0% contraction in same-store sales, while Quick Service saw a modest 0.3% growth in Q2 2025. This contrast underscores the specific difficulties within the Argentinian market.

Given the low growth and significant challenges present, Alsea's Argentinian segment aligns with the characteristics of a Dog in the BCG matrix. The market conditions are not conducive to substantial expansion or high returns at this time.

Alsea's Burger King operations in Mexico and Chile, along with its Argentinian segment, are exhibiting characteristics of Dogs in the BCG matrix. These units are experiencing declining or stagnant same-store sales, such as Burger King Chile's 5.1% drop in Q2 2025, indicating low market share and growth potential.

The divestment of 54 Burger King units in Spain in December 2024 further supports this classification, as these were likely underperforming assets. Starbucks' operations in France and Benelux also show potential Dog status due to a 10% sales decline in Europe during Q2 2024, exacerbated by consumer boycotts.

Alsea's strategy of opening new stores in underdeveloped regions, particularly in the State of Mexico with an investment exceeding MX$300 million by the end of 2025 for around 15 new locations, aligns with the concept of Stars or Question Marks within the BCG Matrix. These ventures are designed to capture nascent market share in areas with significant growth potential, even if some of Alsea's brands are mature overall.

Question Marks in Alsea's portfolio represent brands or ventures in high-growth markets where the company currently has a low market share. These require significant investment to foster growth and potentially become Stars. The expansion into Paraguay with Starbucks, for example, fits this profile, as does the planned introduction of Chipotle into Mexico.

Alsea's strategy for these Question Marks involves substantial capital allocation for marketing and operational development to build brand recognition and capture market share. The success of these ventures is not guaranteed, reflecting the inherent uncertainty of Question Marks in the BCG matrix.

By 2025, Alsea aims to establish a significant presence in new European markets, targeting 400 new establishments. Brands entering these territories, or those with minimal presence in high-potential regions within existing markets, are considered Question Marks, needing investment to gain traction against established competitors.

The digital transformation initiatives, while classified as Stars due to their high growth potential, also have elements of Question Marks in their early stages of implementation, requiring focused investment to ensure they achieve their projected market impact by 2025.