Chick-fil-A Tests 2 Story Restaurant With 4 Lanes

[Alpha8472]

The new concept will be a 2 story restaurant with a kitchen above. There will be 4 drive-thru lanes. Your order will be delivered by conveyor belts and down a chute. There will be a walk up store for digital orders. The concept will try to get customers to ditch the dining room in favor of digital pickup or drive-thru.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/27/business ... index.html

[Bagels]

They're converting at least two locations near me to drive-through only. The restaurants are (or at least were) completely gutted with all signage removed. Wonder what they have against dining rooms? Oh yeah... $$$.

[storewanderer]

They're converting at least two locations near me to drive-through only. The restaurants are (or at least were) completely gutted with all signage removed. Wonder what they have against dining rooms? Oh yeah... $$$.

Are they offering a walk up window? How will they serve customers without a vehicle?

The Reno Chickfila has stunk like a dirty McDonalds inside for over a year. It is nauseatingly bad most visits and only gets worse as the day goes on. It also is quite dirty in there. Their food has been a lot better the past few months, service still reminds me of somewhere other than Chickfila; not really bad but just something off and not Chickfila level service.

The dine-in experience at Chickfila used to be more pleasant than usual fast food places as it tended to be cleaner and they tried to do a little nice things like a flower vase on some tables and nicer looking restrooms, but it has really gone downhill since COVID.

I have noticed none of the indoor play areas at Chickfila ever reopened from COVID around my area. They used to get a lot of families in there at dinner, it seems like they have basically decided they don't want them there anymore.

Maybe Chickfila can employ a new real estate strategy finding failed Sonic locations to take over if they want to be drive through only.

[Alpha8472]

The playgrounds at fast food restaurants are very labor intensive. I heard that kids puke in the playground practically every day. The cleanup costs alone make them very unattractive to restaurants these days.

That dirty Chick-fil-a sounds like they are trying to discourage dine in by making the dining room as repulsive as possible.

McDonald's has been eliminating most playgrounds when they remodel. However, some have been retained, but heavily modified so that they are sit down playground areas with video games. Less physical activity means less vomiting.

[storewanderer]

The playgrounds at fast food restaurants are very labor intensive. I heard that kids puke in the playground practically every day. The cleanup costs alone make the very unattractive to restaurants these days.

That dirty Chick-fil-a sounds like they are trying to discourage dine in by making the dining room as repulsive as possible.

McDonald's has been eliminating most playgrounds when they remodel. However, some have been retained, but heavily modified so that they are sit down playground areas with video games. Less physical activity means less vomiting.

There are a few McDonalds in my area left with the indoor playgrounds. The locations that had outdoor playgrounds removed all of them.

I also feel Chickfila is trying to discourage dine in. I am getting the vibe out of more and more fast food places they only want drive through business. They don't want you coming in and doing a to go order and they really really don't want you eating inside. This is fine for various D grade brands like Taco Bell and Jack in the Box that were 80%+ drive through business in the first place before COVID ever happened, but for what was supposed to be a "better" brand like Chickfila, this is not really acceptable and will hurt their brand long term.

[ClownLoach]

Chick-fil-A seems to be developing problems in some markets. In Orange County they had a location in Orange that was closed for almost a year for a "remodel" although all the signs were removed and the building looked like a permanent closure until it abruptly reopened a couple months ago. It was just fine inside and didn't need any kind of serious remodeling nor did it seem to have problems with drive through or kitchen flow.

Now they have a location that underwent major remodeling in 2021-2022 in Irvine to reroute the drive through and construct overhangs for outside order taking, double lane and so on that is completely closed. This was a very, very busy location that always had dozens of cars in line (necessitating the remodel to double lanes). Business was not a issue. On their website it says the location is under a "Seasonal Closure." What kind of issues in Irvine cause a seasonal closure? Too much sun? If it was the location next to UC Irvine closed I could probably understand a "seasonal closure" when classes aren't in session. But this was just remodeled (although interior cosmetically didn't change much they did realign the kitchen, counters and so on to accommodate the reconfigured drive thru) and the new drive thru operation probably cost millions in modifications. Removing an inside kids area wouldn't necessitate a closure either. My guess is that they can't staff their other 3 restaurants nearby and decided to shut one down then disperse the staff to the others. But staffing wasn't a problem for them before, similar to how we see In-N-Out always fully staffed. Something has gone wrong with Chick-fil-A to be having so many issues that they need to close busy locations for months.

As far as these wacky multi lane drive through concepts go (I think Taco Bell had a similar two story one?) I expect this nonsense to die down quickly. This is another example of Wall Street pushing an agenda that doesn't make any sense upon these companies such as the many stores that are wasting incredible amounts of payroll on unprofitable e-commerce efforts. Being a private company I have no idea why Chick-fil-A is even playing the same game; they probably got sold on trying out a prototype by the same clowns that are peddling the idea to Taco Bell, Shake Shack and others for these incredibly expensive to build multi level mechanized restaurants. Although I know we have one on this board who dislikes In-N-Out operations they seem to be doing just fine without online ordering, Doordash, and other gimmicks that ultimately add complications and labor to the process while slowing the kitchen flow at the same time, necessitating massive price increases to offset the lost sales and labor productivity.

Doordash and other services are already declining severely as people are realizing they can't afford a 40% or more markup plus fees and tip, not to mention that their gig workers are abandoning the platforms because they're underpaid. Before I moved out of Irvine it had become nearly impossible to reliably get a order delivered. My final three orders there were either never picked up or misdelivered and refunded almost two hours later (forcing me then to leave and go get food elsewhere myself, and the restaurant winds up throwing out food that sat for a driver who never picked up - a cost that gets passed along to the other customers). Building a restaurant with a lane for Doordash pickups is just going to add to the cost and force an even higher price. I'm already unhappy with how expensive Chick-fil-A has become recently and can't help but wonder how much of that is because the local restaurants wind up having to dedicate an employee just to managing a underutilized order pickup rack that is ignored by obnoxious Doordash workers that shove customers aside as they're ordering at the register to yell at the cashier "I'm here for a Doordash order, why isn't it done yet? I need you to get someone on this now" as if they're the highest priority and the customer standing there with money in hand is invisible.

[veteran+]

"Although I know we have one on this board who dislikes In-N-Out operations......"

That ONE being me.

[pseudo3d]

I will say that Chick-fil-A has the staffing to actually manage a two-lane drive-through very well. Some other fast foods...don't.

[ClownLoach]

I will say that Chick-fil-A has the staffing to actually manage a two-lane drive-through very well. Some other fast foods...don't.

They really are struggling with staffing in some markets. I'm not sure if they actually could manage this well.

[storewanderer]

I will say that Chick-fil-A has the staffing to actually manage a two-lane drive-through very well. Some other fast foods...don't.

They really are struggling with staffing in some markets. I'm not sure if they actually could manage this well.

I am still seeing them throw a ton of people at the drive through. I will see 6-8 people outside plus 4-6 people inside near the window to push those orders. Meanwhile front counter has 1 employee on register, 1 employee trying to assemble orders deliver orders/arrange mobile orders, and if they're lucky a third employee who will take the task of delivering orders/arranging mobile orders. Nobody is cleaning anything and it shows/smells. They could try to convert to kiosk ordering and self serve drinks since they basically put it as last priority to staff front counter. They stopped using the pick up shelves due to order theft around Reno (Sparks may still use an order shelf) which I think was a dumb move but I guess they were having serious order theft issues at multiple locations. There has to be a solution to that issue.