Chick-fil-A has opened its first elevated drive-thru restaurant, featuring an innovative food conveyor system designed to enhance service speed and streamline the drive-thru experience. Located at 2155 Jodeco Road in McDonough, Georgia, just south of Atlanta, the restaurant began serving customers on August 22.
This unique drive-thru-only concept includes four lanes and an elevated kitchen that utilizes a sophisticated conveyor belt system. This system allows meals to be transported from the kitchen to team members on the ground every six seconds. The kitchen itself is twice the size of a typical Chick-fil-A kitchen, enabling the restaurant to handle two to three times more vehicles compared to standard locations.
Customers have two options to receive their meals: they can order ahead using the Chick-fil-A app and pick up their food in the dedicated Mobile Thru lanes, or they can place orders with team members in the traditional drive-thru lanes. The design also includes dedicated pull-aside lanes to ensure that Chick-fil-A’s signature hospitality is maintained.
Jonathan Reed, Executive Director of Design for Chick-fil-A, emphasized the restaurant’s focus on meeting the needs of busy customers. “With the new Elevated Drive-Thru design, featuring our first four-lane drive-thru, we’re aiming to deliver quality food and genuine hospitality in a way that’s uniquely Chick-fil-A,” he said.
This new restaurant is the second innovative concept introduced by Chick-fil-A this year, following the opening of a mobile pickup-only location in New York City in March. The New York restaurant focuses on delivery and mobile app orders to cater to the fast-paced lifestyle of city residents.
Chick-fil-A is one of the largest quick-service restaurant chains in the United States, employing over 200,000 people across more than 3,000 locations in the U.S., Canada, and Puerto Rico. The company has plans for further expansion into Europe and Asia by 2030.