Situated about 40 miles southwest of Atlanta and right off Interstate 75 is McDonough, Georgia. A quick Google search will reveal the Henry County town’s claim to fame—the filming of scenes from the 1977 classic Smokey and the Bandit. In today’s McDonough, however, smoky refers to something different: the barbecue from Shane’s Rib Shack, where Shaniacs go to enjoy their favorite fare.

But Shaniacs don’t have to hang around this 15,000-person town to experience some of Shane’s secret sauce anymore, and soon they won’t even have to travel very far to get to the nearest shack. Since being acquired by Raving Brands in 2004, Shane’s Rib Shack announced its plans to open 500 stores across the country by 2010. And there are already stores in 11 states including Arizona and Michigan, neither of which has a reputation for barbecue.

Can the brand continue its growth while maintaining its consistency and homegrown feel? Founder Shane Thompson says absolutely. But that wasn’t always the case. Shane’s early concerns about being controlled by a larger, more powerful company have subsided, but there are still some critics who question the authenticity of his once home-town concept.

To celebrate Shane’s Rib Shack’s fifth anniversary and shed light on all that has happened during those five years, Shane himself, along with Raving Brands Chief Operating Officer Steve LaMastra and Chief Development Officer Chris Morocco, sat down with QSR to discuss the past, present, and future of the brand that plans to bring barbecue to the masses.

As you hit your fifth anniversary and move toward a national rollout, is this what you had in mind originally for Shane’s Rib Shack?

Thompson: Before this all went to such a big level, it really was more that I was excited that I could share this with other parts of the country. So, it wasn’t top of the mind, but we knew something was kind of brewing with it and it just unfolded from there.

How do you plan to take a homegrown concept and make it work on a national scale?

Thompson: That was the beauty of where I was. I was at a point where my brand had a lot of local recognition, and then when I met up with Raving Brands they had the ability to do something and make it franchisable because that was something I kind of struggled with.

We have the same sauce recipe. We have everything intact, even the way we cook the meat and everything. We looked at where it was scalable on a franchise level. That was the piece that I was really lacking that Raving Brands really supplied for me.