Long John Silver's Opens Gas & C-Store

Long John Silver's Restaurant officials can certainly plead a case for the popularity of their restaurants in a gas station/convenience store with the opening of a new unit at the Ashland Oil Gas Station here, near Louisville and just west of Fort Knox, as first week sales (March 21-28, 2000) reached $26,000 for the unit with 1,100 customers visiting the restaurant on the opening day (March 21) or 11 percent of the Hardinsburg population.

The new non-traditional unit is the 12th C-store restaurant for Long John Silver's and the first since the company was acquired by Yorkshire Global Restaurants. Franchisee for the new Long John Silver's in Hardensberg is Alan Hicks of Midwest Petroleum, Inc.

According to Alan Caldwell, LJS senior vice president franchise operations and development, headquartered in Lexington, KY, the opening day sales represented a record for Long John Silver's [7] in the non-traditional category.

"As this country's largest quick service restaurant for seafood, we are in a unique position to provide a quality meal at a reasonable price, fast and hot," Caldwell said. "The opening of our Hardinsburg restaurant is symbolic of the pent-up demand for our concept and product."

Caldwell said the new restaurant offers carryout service and 32-seats for sit-down customers at the Ashland Oil Station.

Founded in 1969, Long John Silver's was acquired in 1999 by Yorkshire Global Restaurants, who also owns A&W Restaurants, Inc. of Farmington Hills, Mich. The combined operation has more than 2,200 restaurants in the United States and around the world.