The Chick-fil-A restaurant in Arnold is expected to reopen this month, owner and operator Shane Neel said.
As of Monday, he wasn’t sure of the exact date but expected it would be open before the end of November.
The location, 1 Arnold Park Mall, closed July 20 for an extensive remodeling project.
“It will feel like a brand-new restaurant,” Neel said. “Every single inch of the restaurant has been touched. Even some of the studs got replaced. If anything looked aged or had the smallest amount of damage, it was replaced. Besides the brick on the outside of the restaurant, everything will be brand new.”
When the restaurant closed, Neel expected it to reopen in 12 weeks, but construction was delayed because of work required to reconfigure how utilities are connected to the building.
“The utilities were installed pretty deep underground,” he said. “It was unknown how tricky it was going to be to redo some of the utility work.”
Neel said the Arnold Chick-fil-A opened in 2010 at its location near the intersection of Hwy. 141 and Jeffco Boulevard, and when he took over the location in January 2020, he knew changes were needed.
He said the Chick-fil-A corporation, which owns the building, had planned to renovate the restaurant in a couple of years, but that timeline was moved up because of the popularity of the Arnold location.
“Our business has taken off the last few years,” Neel said. “We outgrew the original space. We were busting at the seams.”
New restaurant
Neel said a 500-square-foot addition is being built on the back of the restaurant, increasing the kitchen space and providing more room for drive-thru service.
“With how business was going, we needed to figure out a way to capture more guests and speed up our process to serve customers faster,” he said.
Neel said a permanent, two-lane drive-thru is being installed.
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the restaurant created a makeshift, two-lane drive-thru system that has been used ever since.
When the renovations are completed, the Chick-fil-A will have two drive-thru speaker boxes for customers to order from.
“That will be beneficial early in the morning and the evening,” Neel said. “We will be able to consistently take multiple orders without worrying about weather or lighting issues.”
Vehicles will still line up in lanes that wrap around the building and food will be picked up at a single window. However, Neel said a parallel cockpit is being installed that will be used as both a pickup window and a door for employees to enter and exit the restaurant.
“We will be able to walk in and out of the restaurant to deliver to cars,” Neel said. “That will be unique. The lot was tricky to reconfigure the drive-thru. We are able to do some different things to speed up the process. We will be quicker and more efficient.”
In addition, the dining area will have new furniture and paint, Neel said.
He said the restaurant’s seating capacity will still be about 100 customers, but the layout will be improved.
“We are excited for it to all come together,” he said.
Employees
Neel said when the location was closed for remodeling, the restaurant had about 80 employees.
He said some employees transferred to other Chick-fil-A restaurants in the area, and some employees took part in a corporate program to work at restaurants throughout the country.
“We had a lot of team members interested in traveling throughout the U.S. while we were closed,” Neel said. “They got to get their feet wet to be honest and see what we are going to have. Anything a new restaurant has, we will have.”
He said Chick-fil-A provided employees some pay during the closure.
Neel also said most of the employees who worked at the Arnold location before it closed will return, but he currently is hiring and would like to add about 30 new employees.
“I can’t imagine losing a whole team and having to find 80 to 100 team members to reopen,” he said. “We hope to be around the 100-mark for employees when we reopen. We are expecting to be pretty busy when we reopen.
“We are antsy to get back open, and I know people in the area are kind of starving for it.”
For information about the Chick-fil-A in Arnold, go to its Facebook page. Those interested at working at the restaurant may text cfaarnold at 314-462-2732.
