Burger Singh

Burger Singh is the story of one nickname. Kabir Jeet Singh, from an army family, went to the University of Birmingham for an MBA and paid his way with evening shifts at a burger restaurant and night shifts at a pub. He found British burgers bland, started working Indian spices into the patties, and friends began calling him Burger Singh. Back in India, he opened the first Burger Singh in Gurgaon in 2014, in a space of about 98 square feet.

The idea was never to copy McDonald’s but to make the burger taste Indian. There is no beef on the menu. Instead, the patties are paneer, potato, mixed vegetables, fried chicken and mutton, and the sauces come from Indian cooking: tandoori sauce, the buttery makhani gravy of butter chicken, mint mayo, a Bihari spice sauce. Many burgers are named with Bollywood and Punjabi wordplay.

The chain grew through small, cheap outlets built for delivery apps, and now has more than 100 of them in over 50 cities. Revenue reached 90 crore rupees in the 2022–23 financial year, up from about 29 crore, and it has been ranked the third most popular burger brand on Indian delivery apps.

More than 100 outlets in over 50 Indian cities, many of them small outlets built for delivery.

• Mom's Touch (South Korea, since 1997). Korea’s chicken burger chain, famous for a whole fried thigh in a bun. Also built on chicken.
• Dicos (China, since 1994). China’s home-grown rival to KFC, built on Texas-style fried chicken. Also built on chicken.
• Wallace (China, since 2001). China’s budget fried chicken and burger chain, with more restaurants than KFC. Also built on chicken.
• Wat-a-Burger (India, since 2016). “India ka Burger”: aloo tikki, paneer and tandoori makhani burgers from Noida. Also built on chicken.