David Holmes/Contributor
Vancouver Island’s newest Lee’s Chicken fast food franchise is hoping to be open for business in early September.
The unique take-out-only restaurant is located at 624 Admirals Rd. in Esquimalt. Its soft opening is scheduled for Sept. 6. As the days progress, its presence will grow.
“This will be our fourth store on Vancouver Island, with our first one opening in Duncan about 20 years ago. About a decade later, we opened stores in Nanaimo and Campbell River. With the opening of the new Esquimalt store, this is basically us taking the company to the next level,” said Dan Bertrand, operations manager for Lee’s Chicken on Vancouver Island.
Founded by Lee Cummings and Harold Omer in Lima, Ohio in 1966, Lee’s Chicken has more than 150 franchise operations across the United States, with the four Vancouver Island outlets the only ones operating in Canada.
“There’s a plan in the works to open another store within the next year or so, possibly elsewhere within the Capital Region, but no details have been finalized.
The only thing we do know is that it will be somewhere on Vancouver Island,” Bertrand said.
While other Lee’s Chicken operations include drive-through and dine-in services, the Esquimalt store will provide take-out and third-party delivery only, thanks to SkipTheDishes and DoorDash.
“One thing we’ve learned from the pandemic is that people are a lot more comfortable with take-out and delivery these days. If your store has dine-in and no one is using it that’s a lot of unused real estate you’re paying for,” Bertrand said.
“By building this store from the ground-up as a take-out only operation, we’re essentially serving as a proof-of-concept model for other stores down the line. We’re sort of a prototype or pilot project.”
The Vancouver Island Lee’s Chicken group has more than 100 employees, a number expected to eventually climb to 125 once the Esquimalt store is in operation.
“We’re trying to pivot with the changing times, so if this operation launches and proves successful for us, we may replicate it at our current stores in the future. Our store is a test case to see how we can bring this industry as we see it forward in the next few years,” Bertrand said.
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