Almost no chinese chains here S Florida that I know of, except for Manchu Wok. There is a good Japanese sushi buffet chain called Taisho.
There is at least one PF Chang’s in Atlanta and there was at least one China Coast as well. I tend to think of both of them the same way: cool decor and mediocre food that’s not nearly as good as a good strip-mall Chinese place but costs twice as much. Apparently I’m one of the few that believes that - PF Chang’s is always jam packed.
Also, now that I live in Charlotte I can also say that there’s a PF Chang’s here too.
I don’t recall seeing the Panda Express there, but I admit I don’t frequent that part of Torrance too much. The closest PE to me is the one at the Torrance Crossroads shopping center, inside the Vons.
And not to hijack this any further, but the Del Amo Fashion Center is way overdue for a demolition and renovation, preferably with one of those awesome new open-air malls.
There is a block in N.Y. Citys China Town, that consists of some 15 take-out, and delivery restaurants. The local joke is that they all share the same downstairs kitchen. 
I just did some research and you are correct. China Coast was owned by Darden Restaurants Inc. The parent company of Olive Garden and Red Lobster. It seems that they also have a BBQ chain called Smokey Bones Barbecue & Grill, but that dog won’t hunt in Texas.
The food court at Edison Mall in Ft.Myers had 3 Chinese food places out of the 10 places to eat.
And of course they all wanted you to try a sample on a toothpick.
“Bourbon Chicken!” “Teriyaki Chicken!” “Orange Cicken!” “Seasame Chicken!”
I thought that Wok-n-Go “I know it’s only Wok-n-Go, but I like it.” was a chain, but nobody else mentioned it.
Now to the hijack… IME, For every Chi Chi’s, there are 10 (seemingly) independent Mexican restaurants. Yet, like Excalibre mentioned about “the eerie sameness of Chinese takeout places”, almost all of them have essentially the same menu. The first item listed on the Lunch menu is the Speedy Gonzales (taco, enchilada, and choice of rice or beans) for $3.20 - ~ $5.00. [Easily the cheapest item on the menu. I’d have that for lunch every day if I could. Not counting the tip, it costs about the same as Taco Bell’s version, and twice as good.] Anyway, I have a hypothesis that there’s some underlying company that tell immigrants wanting to open a restaurant, "We’ve got a (proven successful) kit that you can buy that will show you how to run a Mexican restaurant properly. If you don’t buy our kit, then every gringo who eats at your place will scream “Where’s my Speedy Gonzales? Where’s my number 2 combo? This isn’t the kind of food that I was expecting! I was expecting something like what I get from ‘El [insert random Spanish word]’ across town! I’ll never come here again!”.
… but that’s just my hypothesis.
Also, most will list about 5 to 10 other locations in 5 or 10 other nearby cities. Rarely 2 locations in the same city. BUT, there will be 5 or 10 other different (seemingly unrelated and in-competition) restaurants in the same city; again, each listing on their menu 5 or 10 locations in other cities.
(I’m just trying to ask a question and keep it tangently related to the OP and other posts.)
Oh, man, one time there was this rather stocky Asian woman in the Natick Mall who was yelling (quite loudly) in the middle of the food court “Orange Chicken! Chicky chick! Chicken good! You try!?! Orange Chick! Chicky chick!”…or something like that. I thought she was a little nuts at first until I spied…
The Toothpick!
Well give me another heapin’ helpin’ o’ that fat-laden Orange Chicken, Ma’am!
We have a Vietnamese chain here, called Pho Hoa. The web site lists locations in Washington, California, Florida, New York as well as “Canada, Asia, Brunei, Indonesia, Korea, Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore” Main menu item is Vietnamese Noodle Soup - you get a bowl of soup for about 4 bucks. Mind you, the small is a rather large bowl, and a large can feed a small family (for a couple of bucks more). A friend takes her family (parents, three kids) and feeds them all with one large and one small.
OK - further into the site - locations also in Utah, Illinois, North Carolina, Virginia, Texas (as ‘Pho Cong Ly’), Philidelphia, Nevada, and Massachusetts,
Here we have Panda Express, and the smaller chains Flaming Wok and The Mustard Seed.
We have a rather mediocre local chain called the Rice House.
And a Charlie Chiang’s, which serves ok food in a decent sit down setting, with overpriced overiced sodas sold one by one in small glasses. Better to order some take-out from one of the ubiquitous Number One Chinese Food or Hunan Delight hole in the walls.
Does every town have at least one Number One Chinese Food or a Hunan Delight? And am I the only one who has misread that as Human Delight?
I prefer Szechuan cuisine to Mandarin or Cantonese. I know there’s other regional Chinese cuisines, but I can’t think of them.
OK, I can’t resist:
When traveling once in Canada, I think I ate a brand of Chinese noodles which were produced by a company called “Hung-Wang”.
I know, this is in incredibly poor (ahem) taste, and a minor hijack, but I just cannot contain this crass little brain fart.
Carry on.
The only names I’ve seen multiple people in the thread list that I recognize are Panda Express and PF Chang’s.
Panda Express is a mall foodcourt sort of thing, not quite the same spirit as Olive Garden or Red Lobster. They certainly do seem to be everywhere, though (or at least in Nashville and Knoxville (TN), Charleston (SC), and Saratoga Springs (NY)).
PF Chang’s certainly fits the corporate restaurant. Every single one I’ve been in has the lions out front and the lillypond-moodlight ceiling. I have seen them in Nashville, Knoxville, and Chapel Hill (NC). But it’s a Chinese Bistro so I don’t know if it counts. 
Panda Expresses aren’t only in the food courts at the mall. Here in Tucson there’s a free-standing one. After posting about it yesterday, I had to go have the Orange Chicken for lunch.
Their A/C was broken. And I was miserable the whole time. 
There’s also Cafe Rouge, Bella Pasta, La Tasca, Cafe Flo (maybe only in London- I’m not sure), Nando’s (borderline fast food)…
The only Chinese chain restaurant in the UK is Yellow River Cafe- Southern England only, except for one branch in Birmingham. It’s perhaps more surprising that there’s no national chain of Indian restaurants in the UK, given the popularity. I suppose it’s only a matter of time.
Wow, I didn’t know Smokey Bones was owned by the same company! Since moving to New England, there’s been a real dearth of BBQ places. Of the few we found, the only one that’s near us that is anywhere in a league with places we knew in Houston is… Smokey Bones! How about that.
I think Smokey Bones would do OK in Texas. It has a good variety, and would compare favorably with existing chains like Luther’s, and be right in there with Goode Company.
That’s interesting – I’ve never seen a “Speedy Gonzales” on a Mexican menu. Maybe it’s a regional thing?
It’s possible that, rather than being a corporate plan to make them all alike, they merely get that way due to competition and consumer pressure. If it sells well at one restaurant, the others pick it up (either by noticing it themselves, or by being asked about it by a customer). Then restaurants that put popular combinations on their menu do better than those that don’t.
Also, you mentioned lunch menu. Now, if I were making a lunch menu for a Mexican restaurant, and wanted to indicate a quick lunch dish that could come to the table quickly(*), and it’s for the US culture… isn’t an obvious joke to use the name “Speedy Gonzalez”?
(*) I hope that’s why they call it that…
Whups, Mr. Chau is what I meant. The food isn’t very memorable, so maybe I didn’t remember the name very well either.
There’s free standing, or retail-space-in-a-strip-mall ones around here, too. It’s still a fast-food style place, rather than a sit-down resturaunt. The “Panda Inn” would seem to be more of the OP’s “Olive Garden” class, but a quick check of their web site only lists 5, all Southern California.