, occupied by Taco Bell in 2013. This location has since closed. Zantigo was founded in 1969 as Zapata by Marno McDermott, who would later be the co-founder of another Mexican chain,
Chi-Chi's. In 1974, McDermott sold Zapata to
Heublein, owners at the time of
KFC. (Zapata's home Mexican food product line was renamed Ortega at this time.) In 1976, the chain of Zapata Mexican fast-food restaurants was renamed Zantigo. Heublein was acquired by
R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company in 1982. Following the 1985 takeover by Reynolds of
Nabisco, the new company,
RJR Nabisco, divested itself of many businesses. In 1986, KFC was sold to
PepsiCo for $850 million. Since Pepsi already owned a national Mexican food chain,
Taco Bell, the decision was made to close or convert all existing Zantigo restaurants, of which there were 82 as of the October 1, 1986 announcement. The conversion was complete by 1988 and the Zantigo name disappeared. In many cases, the existing Zantigo stores were in better locations or in better physical condition than nearby Taco Bell locations. So, most Zantigo locations were rebranded as Taco Bell and the nearby Taco Bell stores closed. This led to the Taco Bell chain adopting many of the distinctive
Mission Revival-inspired
architectural details of the Zantigo design into new Taco Bell restaurant buildings. Zantigo had several unique menu items, including the Chilito, the Taco Burrito, and Chips 'n' Cheese. Of these, the Chilito was carried over by Taco Bell in former Zantigo markets and was promoted to a chain-wide item, later renamed "Chili-cheese Burrito". ==New Zantigo chain (1996–present)==