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Fast-food aficionados on Maui are eagerly awaiting Thursday’s opening of Hawaii’s first Chick-fil-A restaurant, best-known for its chicken sandwiches, waffle fries and lemonade.
The 5,013-square-foot restaurant is located at
14 Hookele St. in the Pu‘unene Shopping Center, in a relatively new commercial area being developed on former Alexander &Baldwin sugar cane fields in Kahului.
The nearby competition includes Zippy’s, a local favorite, just across the street, and a little more than a block in the other direction is a newly opened Raising Cane, a fast-food chain known for its chicken fingers. A little farther down Hookele Street is a new Taco Bell and the site of a planned Sonic fast-food restaurant — another first for Hawaii.
It was perhaps no coincidence that Raising Cane
celebrated its opening Tuesday, just two days before
rival Chick-fil-A. And if the long line of cars waiting to turn into Raising Cane’s parking lot and the throng of customers standing outside are any indication, Thursday’s Chick-fil-A opening is sure to generate even more of a crowd.
“Well, I think about half of Maui and maybe a few of the other islands are going to
be flying in to come visit us,” chuckled Sean Whaley,
independent owner/operator of the Chick-fil-A Kahului franchise when asked about the expected turnout. “I’m sure it’s going to be very busy here.”
In anticipation of the first-day crush, Maui police officers will be on hand to manage the flow of traffic and keep first responder lanes open, he said.
Whaley, who moved with his family to Maui in April to launch the business, most
recently owned and operated a Gandolfo’s New York Deli in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif. He said he was pursuing a Chick-fil-A franchise there when the company asked if he would consider opening the Maui restaurant — an offer he found hard to refuse.
Despite the state’s reported labor shortage, Whaley said Chick-fil-A Kahului was able to hire roughly 160 full- and part-time workers. Starting pay is a competitive $18 an hour.
The spacious restaurant has an indoor dining room with seating for 114, as well as a 900-square-foot patio that seats 46.
During a media preview Tuesday, company representatives described the restaurant’s drive-thru service, designed to expedite the process of ordering and pickup by doing away with the speaker boxes commonly found at most fast-food places. There are two drive-thru lanes and employees will provide “face-to-face” ordering, walking along the lines of vehicles to take orders using smart tablets and collect payment.
The menu features Chick-fil-A’s signature hand-breaded, fried chicken breast sandwiches, starting at $5.79 alone and $10.29 as a meal, and chicken nuggets with seven dipping sauces, starting at $5.95 for eight pieces. Both are available grilled.
Other items include
waffle potato fries, mac
and cheese, salad entrees, kids’ meals, “hand-spun” milkshakes and lemonade made from real lemon juice, cane sugar and water. There’s a breakfast menu as well.
Chick-fil-A Kahului will be open for dine-in, drive-thru and carry-out service from
6 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday; the restaurant is closed
Sundays.
Chick-fil-A, based in College Park, Ga., has more than 2,700 restaurants in 47 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and Canada. The Maui outlet is the state’s first but won’t be the last: The company earlier announced that three Chick-fil-A restaurants on Oahu — in Ala Moana Center, Makiki and Kapolei — are expected to open either later this year or next year as part of a plan to add several more locations across the state in the next five years.
To introduce itself to the community, Chick-fil-A Inc. donated $25,000 to Maui Food Bank and a $300,000 True Inspiration Award grant to The Maui Farm, a nonprofit that serves local families.
The company also has a Shared Table Program that donates surplus food from its restaurants to local soup kitchens, shelters, food banks and other nonprofits.
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