Yet Another Burger Chain Flirts With Dallas, But, For Now, Takes Its Meat to East Texas

In fast-food news, this note out of Denver: A burger chain called Smashburger announced today that it's expanding from one Texas location (a corporate-owned joint in Houston) to 75 locations in the coming five years, including 10 just-announced franchises in East Texas. A little digging on the burger chain's site...

By Robert Wilonsky

May 12, 2009

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In fast-food news, this note out of Denver: A burger chain called Smashburger announced today that it's expanding from one Texas location (a corporate-owned joint in Houston) to 75 locations in the coming five years, including 10 just-announced franchises in East Texas. A little digging on the burger chain's site also revealed that last September, official word was Dallas was next on the to-do list. In fact, eight months ago the Colorado company said it was but days away from signing its first local lease, with a second to follow shortly either in North Dallas or Plano-Frisco.

But ... unh-unh.

Jennifer Miller, the burgeria's spokesperson, tells Unfair Park today that while "Dallas is still a market for Smashburger," the deal announced last fall never came to fruition. Why come? "Nothing specific," she says. "It was just the nature of working through deals and things like that. There was nothing specific we can point to. ... In Dallas, we're just waiting for the right partner at this point." (Earlier today, another Smashburger exec told Unfair Park the chain has "perspective deals [we] hope to finalize" here sooner than later.) In other words, you want a Smashburger, drive to Houston. Or Tyler, later this year. Is it worth it? Our sister paper in Denver seems to think so; so too our Houston outpost.

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