Burrito lovers rejoice. Everyone's favorite burrito chain, Chipotle, announced that it will open more locations catered only to those looking for takeout.
We have all been there when the line at Chipotle is out the door, leaving you with the dilemma: take a longer lunch break or grab faster food. Now the chain will make it easier to grab your burrito and get out the door.
With already 1,700 locations, Chipotle plans to further expand its fast food model to open more than 4,000 locations of a scaled down version of its current restaurants.
"We're looking at some sites right now in the United States as well where these stores will be really, really, really small and where we would have very, very little ceiling," Chipotle co-CEO Montgomery Moran said in July. "There are a number of reasons why we think that that is a good idea, one of which is that where as we used to be a mostly a dining restaurant 14 years ago, and I'd say about eight years ago, we were 50/50 dining and take-out. Now we're about two-thirds takeout."
The prototype locations that offer only takeout will require less investment since it costs Chipotle about $80,000 to build its restaurant with seating area, while still supplying the demand. However, sales are expected to be lower, $1.4 million per store compared to the approximately $2.5 million the locations with seating make to accommodate crowds during busy lunch and dinner hours.
Chipotle has already launched these smaller locations in Europe.
This is not the only reason why the chain has made headlines recently. Chipotle's Twitter account was hacked, its avatar changed to a swastika and a series of racist tweets were sent. Chipotle apologized for the "very offensive messages," which included messages targeted at President Obama on Sunday.
[PHOTO CREDIT: Mike Mozart]
