Is this really what you call fast food?
The MGHerring Group yesterday announced In-N-Out Burger will open a location at The Village at Allen in mid-2011, bringing the count of confirmed future openings in the DFW area to four. But the idolized restaurant chain's still mum as to exactly when the first store will open or why progress has seemingly lagged since the company made its Garland plans public back in May.
The Dallas Morning News last month reported In-N-Out was in negotiations to construct a regional patty distribution center, which could plausibly account for the slow opening pace--but the restaurant's not saying.
"I can't give you any information," said a marketing department assistant who was friendly enough when I reached her by phone and identified myself as a reporter seeking a spokesperson, but became aghast after learning I planned to print what she said.
"I don't approve of that," she told me.
The information the assistant wouldn't provide included the average construction time for an In-N-Out restaurant, but a Nevada devotee in 2004 chronicled the process from slab-laying to opening day. Construction took five months.
By comparison, it took just under four months to build one of the biggest McDonalds in Texas, a 7,800-square-foot store that opened yesterday in Irving.
