Chick-fil-A opens a new 2-story restaurant you literally drive right through
I feel like I’m back in an ’80s downtown bank building drive-thru, but maybe this could work. Chick-fil-A just opened its first-ever elevated drive-thru restaurant in McDonough, Georgia, just south of Atlanta. The new location, called Chick-fil-A Jodeco Road, has customers literally driving straight through it. Unlike traditional drive-thrus, the restaurant features four lanes and an innovative food transport system that moves meals from a second-story kitchen to the ground level.
The lifted kitchen is double the size of a typical Chick-fil-A restaurant. It uses a conveyor system to speed up service, delivering meals to team members every six seconds. The company said in a press release that it expects the four-lane setup to handle two to three times more vehicles than a standard drive-thru. It’s a pickup-order-only store.
This is the second “innovative concept” Chick-fil-A introduced this year. The two-story building follows the launch of a “digital-focused” Mobile Pickup location in New York City in March. The NYC location actually tracks customers on their way to get their orders. A digital order status board in the lobby shows folks whether their order is ready.
Like other drive-thru-only locations, the new Georgia restaurant doesn’t offer dine-in services, but Chick-fil-A assures customers that they will still receive the brand’s “well-known hospitality.” Customers can order ahead using the Chick-fil-A App and pick up their meals in dedicated “Mobile Thru” lanes, or they can place their order with a human in the traditional drive-thru lanes.