Golden Chick has expanded significantly in the past three years, and continues to grow with a reimaging effort and the help of a federal program.
The 48-year old chicken concept currently has 133 units in Oklahoma, Georgia, Texas and South Carolina, five of which are company-owned and the rest of which are franchised.
After adding one to five units a year between 2000 and 2011, Golden Chick ramped up expansion in 2012, adding 11 units, said Mark Parmerlee, president and chairman of Richardson, Texas-based Golden Southern Chicken Corp., which acquired the brand in 1989. The chain added 14 new units in 2013 and 16 new units in 2014.
“We expect to open 30 new restaurants this year,” Parmerlee told Nation’s Restaurant News.
Golden Southern bought Golden Chick, which was then called Golden Fried Chick, after the 63-unit chain fell into financial trouble in the late ’80s.
“I see us continuing to grow in the Southeast and infill in those states between Texas and South Carolina,” Parmerlee said.
Golden Chick had about $111.2 million in sales in its 2014 fiscal year ended Sept. 28, 2014, an increase from $91.3 million the prior year and $74.7 million in fiscal 2012, he said.
Since 2011, Golden Chicken has been reimaged with a more modern look, and roasted chicken has been added to the menu, which appeals to urban customers and those in the brand’s main market of smaller towns, Parmerlee said.
“We sort of plodded along until this most recent increase,” he said, crediting the reimaging program.
The reimaging included replacing fluorescent tube lighting with modern fixtures, and updating décor colors for diner-style black and white checkerboard flooring and accents to a contemporary palette.
A name change was also part of the reimaging.
“It used to be called Golden Fried Chick, so the ‘fried’ is out of the name,” Parmerlee said. “We don’t want to be considered a fried-chicken shack. We want to be known as a good chicken restaurant. Some would say we are headed in the fast-casual direction with a drive-thru.”
More healthful options, like salads and roasted chicken, were added to the menu. Parmerlee retained Dallas-based fine-dining chef Stephan Pyles, who has his own independent restaurants, to develop Golden Chick’s “Golden Roast” line, which started as a rotisserie product and has become a roasted product, as well as a gourmet chicken salad.
“We’re different form the ‘old guard,’ bone-in, fried chicken people because we are more contemporary in menu, décor, colors and still represent a decent price value,” Parmerlee said.
“We even have a premium, farm-raised catfish that’s breaded in-store,” he added.
Most of Golden Chick’s new units are new construction, with a target of 2,200 square feet with 55 seats and drive-thru areas. Takeout and drive-thru business accounts for about 70 percent of sales, Parmerlee said.
Average unit volumes are about $17,000 per week, and Parmerlee expects that to grow 5 percent to 7 percent this year. Blended lunch and dinner average checks are around $8.
In January, Golden Chick opened its first restaurant under the federal government’s EB-5 Immigrant Investor program, which offers a streamlined path to citizenship for certain foreign investors. Other restaurants, including Miami-based sandwich brand Miami Subs, have also used the program.
EB-5 was developed in 1990 to promote job creation and capital investment. Administered by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services agency, EB-5 lets investors from other countries earn U.S. citizenship for themselves and their immediate family by investing in a business on U.S. soil that creates at least 10 full-time jobs.
“An immigrant investor can invest $500,000 in a targeted employment area, or $1 million otherwise, to create at least 10 full-time, permanent jobs,” Parmerlee said. “Once they have demonstrated a track record of that, they are granted a Green Card for them and their family.”
Golden Chick’s first EB-5 restaurant opened in January in Lancaster, Texas.
“Our partner is a doctor from Taiwan,” Parmerlee said. “We have four more units slated for EB-5 that are under contract and about to begin construction. The group we are working with want to eventually have 10.”
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