case study

How Taco Bueno Added 34K Members and Grew Frequency 61% in Just Three Months

Thanx helps drive high-margin growth

34,000

New members (first 3 months)

174x

Growth in returning guests

$860k

revenue from engaged guests

About

Driving Repeat Visits and Rapid Adoption

Founded in 1967, Taco Bueno has built a loyal following across generations on the strength of fresh, made-in-house Tex-Mex, but its digital infrastructure hadn't kept pace with its legacy. With 65% of revenue running through the drive-thru and no app or loyalty program in place, the brand had no reliable way to understand who was coming back, why, or how to bring them back sooner. Email and SMS campaigns went out, but without a centralized platform, the team couldn't segment by what guests ordered, build campaigns around visit behavior, or create the kind of interactive moments that keep a brand feeling alive.

Taco Bueno partnered with Thanx to build a loyalty experience designed from the start to change guest behavior, not just recognize it. By combining segmentation, automation, and creative campaign design, Taco Bueno transformed the app into a high-impact engagement channel that drives repeat visits and measurable revenue.

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We didn’t just want to launch an app. We wanted to fundamentally change how we engage with our customers and drive real behavior.

Dani Perales, Director of Marketing & Innovation

Taco Bueno

RESULTS

Taco Bueno saw immediate results with
one of their most important guest co-horts

Engaged members

9,000+

% of loyalty revenue from engaged
guests

61%

Engaged guest revenue

$860K

What Made It Work

‍

Why Taco Bueno Chose Thanx

Real-time engagement: Needed to launch campaigns quickly and automate rewards and messaging instantly
Accelerate digital orders: Wanted frictionless enrollment and optimized web and app ordering experience
Advanced segmentation: Searching for ways to target messaging based on guest behavior
Flexible creative campaigns: Looking to create gamified and behavior-based promotions

Gamified Campaign Design

Taco Bueno wanted the app to feel fun, not just functional. So they built Bueno Bingo, a campaign that gave guests a “card” of item-based challenges to complete, with a "blackout" reward waiting at the end. The campaign turned transactions into an interactive experience that encouraged repeat visits, generating ~$76k in revenue in February alone.

Behavior-Based Segmentation

The team built campaigns that felt personal. Item-level segmentation meant each guest saw challenges relevant to what they actually ordered, not generic offers sent to everyone. Item-level targeting enabled highly specific and effective campaign logic.

Real-Time Automation

Rewards and messaging were delivered instantly, reinforcing engagement. Targeted messaging also surfaced LTOs and location-specific updates to the right guests at the right time in-app.

Urgency-Driven Strategy

Automated email and push campaigns encouraged customers to return sooner.

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