- [Narrator] Americans make six billion visits a year
to more than 200,000 of them across the nation.
- The drive-through has changed
the way America eats on the go.
- [Employee] Hi, there.
What could I get for you today?
- [Narrator] But 80 years ago,
the fast food drive-through doesn't exist.
- Everybody thinks that McDonald's invented
the drive-through when in fact
they were one of the latest ones to adopt it.
- [Narrator] It starts with a cash strapped delivery man.
- There's a line forming.
- [Narrator] With a radical idea.
- Going as fast as we can.
- [Narrator] Piecing together technology ahead of its time.
- Testing.
Hello.
- People are like "Intercom."
Like what?
I don't understand.
- In-N-Out is sort of the perfect name for this business.
- [Narrator] And a struggling restaurateur
plows forward with the same idea.
- He actually named the clown, Jack.
- [Narrator] And completely rewrites
the future of fast food.
- We need something you can hold with a hand on the wheel.
- [Narrator] But the industry leader stays behind the curve.
- They don't implement a single drive-through.
- [Narrator] Until one franchisee goes rogue.
- He decides he's putting in a drive-through,
his own way.
- [Narrator] And it leads to the drive-through
now powering 75% of all fast food orders
and revolutionizing our entire modern
on-the-go existence.
- We're talking about completely
transforming our day-to-day lives.
- It changed the game for everyone.
[spirited upbeat music]
[upbeat music]
- [Narrator] It's the mid 1940s.
60% of families now own an automobile.
- [Natalia] This is a time when your car
becomes almost an extension of your home.
In your car, you can get food,
you can get entertainment.
This is a really new thing in the mid-century United States.
- They thought of everything, haven't they?
- Sure have.
- [Narrator] And Southern California
becomes the epicenter of a new trend.
Car culture.
- Los Angeles had more cars per capita
than any other city in the country.
- [David] There was no rapid transit system,
so hence everybody had to have a car.
- [Narrator] In car-centric California,
one type of restaurant explodes in popularity.
It's called the drive-in.
- [Brooke] The idea started in the '30s
with pioneers like the pig stand
and Carpenter's drive-in and Simon's.
- [Gary] The original drive-in restaurant meant parking
and then a car hop with roller skate over to your car
and serve you your meal.
- The idea of having a person deliver you food
to the window of your car was super attractive
because people were so in love with their cars,
they didn't wanna get out of them.
- [Narrator] But while the idea is novel,
it's definitely not "fast food."
- [Bill] It was often a complex meal
that involves stuff like meatloaf, mashed potatoes
and whatever with a large menu of stuff
that was not fast to make or fast to eat.
- In terms of timing,
it was more like going to a restaurant
where you happen to be seated in your car.
- [Narrator] But for now, it's the only option for customers
who like the convenience of eating in their car.
[dramatic upbeat music]
20 miles east of Los Angeles,
a struggling entrepreneur
is chasing a dream
to open a drive-in of his own.
- [Adam] So Harry Snyder grew up working
in his parents' sandwich shop and he did deliveries,
he made sandwiches, he ordered meat.
- [Narrator] He locates a small triangle of land for sale.
It's the cheapest he can find.
- Harry Snyder never had any money,
was always kind of keeping one step
ahead of the landlord for rent,
and he was always doing odd ends
to help supplement the family's income.
- [Narrator] But not a single bank will give him a loan.
- Harry Snyder is desperate for a lifeline,
so he reaches out to a trusted business acquaintance.
- Harry.
- Charles Noden has an extremely successful bakery
that has supplied bread to Harry Snyder's family for years.
So when he hears that Harry
has an idea for a business in the food space,
being that he knows Harry's work ethic,
it intrigues him.
- I thought you said
we were checking out a new burger joint.
- This is it.
- But there's nothing here.
- That's where you come in.
- Harry thinks that this location is ideal
because it sits right off in the future,
San Bernardino Freeway
and it sort of links Downtown LA
with the desert and the ocean.
- [Narrator] His plan is to keep the menu simple
and focus on making high-quality hamburgers.
- You can maybe fit a building,
but where will people park?
- Few spots is all we need.
As long as we keep the menu short
and we move fast enough,
the freeway will bring us steady traffic.
- [Narrator] But what Snyder doesn't know
is that he will birth a $7 billion a year business.
That becomes an iconic family run company.
And the system he builds for speed
will become the industry blueprint.
Introducing the nation's first drive-through,
a breakthrough nearly every fast food chain will follow,
and that now drives three quarters of all fast food sales.
- I just don't see it.
- [Adam] No parking means no cars.
No cars means no customers.
- Harry realizes there are still
some kinks in his business plan
if he's going to make this plan a reality.
- But I can't help you, Harry.
- [Brooke] Without Noden's help,
Snyder has no way of opening a drive-in on his own.
So for now, he's forced to just
keep working his delivery job.
- Fill her up.
Do you guys have a vending machine?
- Yeah. - Great.
- I can get it for you.
- Could I have a cola and chips?
- After taking Noden to go look at this location
and seeing how inadequate it is,
he's in a pretty dark spot.
- No, no, keep the change.
- Thanks. Have a nice day. - You too.
- And then
something hits him somewhere right between the eyes.
An idea,
some inspiration.
- So he starts playing around with this idea.
What if there's a restaurant where you could just drive up
to the window, order your food,
get it, start moving,
and then the next car comes in.
[dramatic upbeat music]
- So you wanna build a gas station that serves burgers?
- No gas, just food and drinks.
- At this point, the drive-through concept
and how it's all set up is just more than novel.
It will be totally foreign to customers.
- It's like a drive-in,
but you don't need space for parking.
Instead, the customer drives in,
gets their food
and drives out.
- Now, the beauty of a model like this
is he doesn't need to invest in things like seats
or the car hops.
Instead, all you really need is a kitchen and a chef.
- But where do they eat it?
- They can take it anywhere they want,
and the beauty is we don't have to clean up after them.
- [Kevin]The idea is like,
we're not gonna go to this place
and sit in our car and eat.
It's just we're gonna go through the drive-through,
pick up the food,
and then either sit in the parking lot
and eat it or bring it home and eat it.
[tense dramatic music]
- So?
[tense dramatic music]
- [Stacy] I think it's so second nature to everybody today,
a drive-through,
but it just seemed like something
from outer space at the time.
- What the heck, let's give it a shot.
- [Kate] Charles Noden ends up fronting $5,000 of his own money
as an early investor in this business.
- [Brooke] But it's completely unproven.
He's securing this loan from Noden,
but he doesn't even know if customers
are gonna wanna pick up their food and eat it in their cars.
So it's a brilliant, yet incredibly risky concept.
- [Narrator] Meanwhile, two hours south in San Diego,
Robert Peterson is the owner of Oscars,
a modest chain of six restaurants.
- [Brooke] Robert Peterson was a savvy
and charismatic businessman
who originally sold restaurant equipment
and then transitioned into the restaurant business.
- [Narrator] In addition to indoor seating,
he also offers drive-in service at his restaurants.
- [Adam C.] Peterson's drive-in has a circus theme to it,
which is what a lot of drive-ins use
to attract people from the road with neon signs
and fun attractions that were family friendly.
- [Narrator] But he's realizing that the drive-in concept
is harder to pull off than he imagined.
- [Adam C.] In spite of its popularity,
drive-ins weren't all that efficient.
- The problem is it takes forever to get served
because the car hops are struggling to keep up.
- It would be sometimes very congested
because people would order some food
and hang out with each other for hours.
- [Jason] But if people are just hanging out in their car,
you know, taking their time,
making out with their girlfriend,
that's not turnover.
You do not make money from having people
just sit in your real estate.
[tense dramatic music]
- Is everything all right?
We waited 30 minutes for this,
and it's cold.
- [Yohuru] Any restaurant that's operating in that landscape
is gonna have the same problem.
How do I not lose those potential consumers?
Because they feel like it's taking too long
for them to get their food.
- [Adam C.] Peterson is coming to the realization
that all the labor costs,
all the real estate costs
and the toll of extensive menus
we're dragging down the key elements
of the success that he hoped to have in terms of profit.
- [Narrator] One day his circus themed chain
will have over 2,000 locations nationwide.
His signature taco will sell over 500 million a year,
more than McDonald's Big Macs,
and he will help turn the fast food drive-through
into a national phenomenon.
- [Brooke] But right now he's just completely at a loss
for how to turn his business around.
This is all he's ever known.
- [Narrator] What Peterson doesn't know
is that a possible solution has already been conceived
just up the road by a man who is about to open
the world's first drive-through.
[tense dramatic music]
- [Narrator] It's October 22nd,1948,
and Harry Snyder is about to make history
when he opens America's first drive-through restaurant.
He calls it.
- Welcome to In-N-Out.
- In-N-Out is really a revolution,
even though I don't think anybody at the time
saw it that way.
- In-N-Out is sort of the perfect name for this business.
It's just very precise and literal of what you're getting.
- [Adam] I think no matter where you are right now,
any given fast food restaurant,
everything from donut shops to burger shops
has a drive-through,
and Harry Snyder really is the father
of this groundbreaking idea.
It has changed the way America eats on the go.
- If you wait just one minute,
your order will be right up. Okay?
One burger, one fry.
- [Narrator] The limited menu just features burgers,
fries, and soft drinks.
- When they first opened their doors,
Harry and his wife Esther are doing everything themselves.
- The kitchen had room for two people.
- [David] It was literally just a window in the side
of the building, that a customer would drive their car up to
and they would order food.
It was just a face-to-face ordering system.
- So outside in Bright Red Neon is a sign with white letters
and stripes reading In-N-Out Burger,
under it or they promise to you no delays.
- [Narrator] But his steadfast commitment to freshness
puts his no delay pledge to the test.
- [Stacy] Harry made the burgers,
he used an ice cream scoop to measure the beef.
Sometimes he would go to the train station
when they would deliver the potatoes and the lettuce
and the onions and inspect it.
[car honks]
- [Narrator] But it's still far from fast food
as we know it. [car honks]
- There's a line forming.
[car honks]
- We're going as fast as we can.
- It just started that no burger patty
went on the grill until you said,
I want a hamburger.
I want a cheeseburger.
- Three more burgers,
two with onions.
- [Chirag] He wanted things to be quick.
One, easy transaction,
drive up, order your food,
grab your food and leave.
This wasn't happening.
- They'll just have to wait.
[car honks]
- So instead of the incredibly fast streamlined service
that Harry envisioned,
the drive-through is slow.
It's pissing his customers off
and not much faster than the service that he rejected,
something had to change.
[car honks]
[dramatic music]
- [Adam] Harry knows that if he is not able
to achieve this no delay service,
he will lose his investment
and he will be unable to pay Noden back.
- He can't stop thinking about how to make it faster.
He's not an engineer,
but he's a natural problem solver
and he has a knack for mechanical systems.
- [Narrator] He envisions a system
that somehow allows customers
to place orders before they pull up to the kitchen.
- [Erin] During World War II,
Harry spent time in Army Air Corps supply depots
where orders and replies were sent over
wired intercom systems.
- [Adam] Now it bears noting that not a lot
of military technology had found its way
into the civilian sector yet,
but he heads to an Army Navy surplus store in Pasadena
and picks through wires and speakers,
transmitters and so on,
and eventually starts piecing them together.
- It's getting late.
We should go to bed.
- I think I got it.
One last time.
[tense dramatic music]
- [David] Wartime often brings a lot
of technological innovation.
- Testing.
Can you hear me?
Hello.
- [David] And rarely do you think of it as applied
to the fast food industry,
but in this case, Harry Snyder said,
I'm familiar with this two-way radio technology.
Why not try it in my drive-up window?
[tense dramatic music]
- Keep talking.
[tense dramatic music]
- [Adam] So the idea of using a military communication system
in a restaurant setting
is nothing short of groundbreaking.
[tense dramatic music]
- [Wife on Radio] If you have to keep doing this,
you could at least make me a milkshake.
[tense dramatic music]
- Welcome to In-N-Out.
Can I take your order?
[triumphant music]
[Esther chuckles]
- [Narrator] While Harry Snyder thinks he's perfected
his new two-way speaker,
he won't know until he gives it a test run.
- [Chirag] So Harry ends up putting the speaker box.
It's about three car lengths away
from the drive-through window.
Customers come up, place their order,
and that order is relayed
back to the kitchen.
- Car just pulled in.
[tense dramatic music]
- Greetings, please let me know your order.
- The drive-through speaker is just sort of awkward.
It's not a phone where you dial someone up
and wait for them to pick up.
It's not like a speaker at a drive in movie
where you're just listening.
[tense dramatic music]
- Hi, can I help you?
- Am I supposed to wait for someone
to take my order or just pull up here?
- Most Americans didn't even know how to interact
with this kind of technology.
- You just order back there.
- I didn't see a phone button or anything.
- You don't need it.
You just talk into the box.
- [Kevin] Believe it or not,
there was a period in human history
where people were like "Intercom?"
Like what?
Talk to a machine,
and there's a person trapped in the machine.
I don't understand.
Apparently it's too confusing.
- What do you mean?
- He left.
- [Narrator] Harry Snyder's groundbreaking
two-way technology isn't catching on with customers,
leaving his new drive-through business concept in jeopardy.
- [Jason] It's crazy to think people feel
so self-conscious about speaking to this weird,
you know, futuristic alien device.
It seems so simple.
- And so to kind of ease people into it,
Harry apparently rigged up this sign
that said two-way speaker for your convenience,
may order without leaving the car.
- [Narrator] And eventually customers begin enjoying
the new convenience.
- Whatever apprehension people had,
they got over it,
'cause they really like those burgers.
- [Adam] It's arguably the quickest way
to get food in existence at this time.
But understand that he's also now
built the first drive-through
three decades before McDonald's,
which has arguably become the gold standard
when it comes to drive-through technology.
- [Narrator] But in 1948,
not only has McDonald's not embraced the drive-through,
they don't offer fast food.
- [Brooke] At this time,
McDonald's is a full drive-in restaurant.
They're serving everything from barbecued beef, ham,
and pork, to tamales,
to a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
- [Adam C.] After eight years of business,
the McDonald's brothers did the unthinkable act
of closing their drive-in for three months
to totally revamp it into a burger stand.
- [Narrator] They go from 25 menu items to only burgers,
fries, drinks, and pie.
- The McDonald's brothers made this transition
because they saw that speed was the thing
that Americans cared about the most.
And so what the McDonald's brothers did
was create a walk-up window where you would be able to park,
but then leave your car, pick up your food,
and then go back to your car and eat it somewhere else.
- [Narrator] Their need for speed inspires
a new kitchen design
known as the speedy service system.
A hamburger goes from grill
to counter in 60 seconds or less.
- Their whole idea was that
we're gonna put the hamburger on the assembly line.
- [Narrator] Sales increase by 40% almost overnight,
but for now they are just a small walk-up outpost.
[dramatic music]
Meanwhile, much like McDonald's,
Robert Peterson thinks simplifying his menu
could be the key to saving his drive-in business.
- Peterson realizes that his existing menu
is a recipe for disaster.
- [Bill] Oscars has an extensive menu of things
like steak dinners and chef salads,
all sorts of stuff all over the map.
It was often a complex meal
that was not fast to make or fast to eat.
- [Narrator] He simplifies the menu to burgers,
fries, and shakes.
- Peterson understands that cars are exactly
what the customers want to arrive in,
but they also want to go much more quickly.
And so he decides to change his model
or else he's gonna go out of business.
- [Brooke] He imagines an ordering system
that's more in the same vein
as what Harry Snyder is doing up north.
But unlike Harry Snyder,
Peterson isn't really a foodie.
He just wants to speed up the process
and rake in more profit.
- [Adam C.] Robert Peterson catches wind
of an intercom system in Anchorage, Alaska
and he flies out the inventor to San Diego
to demo the product for him.
- This is it?
[light playful music]
- It's unclear whether he'd ever heard of In-N-Out.
- [Bill] Southern California was the ultimate
in American car culture.
So it seemed inevitable
that probably more than one guy was gonna figure out
that there was a new and better way
to order burgers from your car.
- [Narrator] But unlike Harry Snyder,
Peterson sees the flaws in the system immediately.
- But if people just see a metal box,
they're not gonna know to talk into it.
- So he realized that having this speaker
just sort of standing up on a pole,
it might look very weird,
very foreign, a little off-putting.
- It needs to be more intuitive and welcoming.
- He realizes that what people are missing
is a little bit of a face-to-face and interaction.
[dramatic music]
- What if
we gave a face to the voice?
- [Erin] Oscar's drive-in
already had the circus design on the building,
so why not just continue with that theme
for his new speaker system?
- Something fun
like a clown,
[upbeat music]
like a Jack-in-the-Box.
[dramatic music]
- [Narrator] In February 1951,
Peterson converts one of his Oscar drive-ins
to a drive-through restaurant.
It features a simple menu board
and clown themed ordering system.
- [Jason] He actually named the clown Jack.
Give your order to Jack.
Jack will take your order.
And it made it homey.
It made it personal.
And pretty soon he's so well known for that intercom
and that clown that he decides
to name the entire restaurant after the clown.
- [Narrator] He calls it Jack in the Box.
- [Kevin] They were talking to this clown head who was
engineered to make a brand-new technological experience
a little more palatable for an American public
that wasn't used to
something as new as an intercom system.
- [Narrator] While Peterson experiments
with just this single drive-through only location.
Harry Snyder has started expanding
his In-N-Out drive-through concept.
- And flip.
Timing is key.
No short or no longer.
- Every time the new restaurant opened, word spread,
and the heavy lift was done by word of mouth.
- [Narrator] They eventually have five locations
within the San Gabriel Valley.
- Five locations may not sound very impressive,
but just remember this.
This wasn't a corporation.
This was a husband and wife.
It was one person's idea.
This was before McDonald's
even opened their second location.
- [Narrator] But his investor, Charles Noden,
is eager to grow the business.
- What's this?
- [Harry] Potential locations?
- [Bill] Harry Snyder was very exacting
with extremely high standards
that by in today's terms would be called a hard-ass.
- There's no way I'll be able to run all these.
- Before he opened another In-N-Out store,
he had to have management
that was trained the way he wanted it to be trained
so that quality wouldn't suffer.
- We cut back on a few things.
We profit by scaling up.
- [Stacy] You would have to cut corners
and place profits over quality
and that was something the Snyders did not wanna do.
- There is a massive schism between Noden and Snyder.
- No, we profit because we serve quality food
that people come back for.
- [Adam] Finally, it leads to a split
with Noden taking three locations
and the original location and one other one
still being under the control of the Snyders
including the very first location in Baldwin Park.
- Financially it was stressful.
He was their main investor,
so they had to come up with a new plan.
[dramatic music]
- [Narrator] It's been two years
since the founder of In-N-Out split with his investor,
and now he's struggling
being financially responsible for all of the business.
- Harry currently owns four locations,
two that he acquired from his split with Noden
and two that he built himself.
- [Narrator] But a piece of news arrives
that could change everything.
- Is there any way out of it?
- So one day in 1954,
Harry ends up getting a letter from the Big Bad Wolf,
the federal government.
They're claiming something called eminent domain,
which allows the federal government
to take over land in order to build out infrastructure.
- [Adam] They are going to expand I-10 right through
Baldwin Park, and the Snyders have 30 days to close up shop.
- [Narrator] For a second time,
he's forced to give up half of his stores.
[tense dramatic music]
- Harry.
- [Adam] But as they say, sunshine follows thunder
and an unexpected boon comes their way.
Because of the rising property values,
the compensation they receive
is more than they paid for the land.
- It ultimately gave him a second lease on life.
- [Narrator] With the government money as a cushion,
Harry's able to open new stores at his own pace.
- So what originally seemed like a disaster is a windfall.
- It allows him to never have to take on
additional investors or franchise.
- He wouldn't build a new In-N-Out
until the other one had been paid off.
So he would never take on debt.
- [Narrator] While growing slowly,
Harry focuses on refining the operations,
adding features that are iconic to this day.
- [Erin] In 1954, he updates the logo,
adding a bright yellow arrow.
He also puts employees in all white uniforms,
signaling, cleanliness and quality
as soon as you drive up to the window.
- [Adam] The other thing is how you can customize your food.
It has arguably the very first secret menu
out of any given national chain.
From your animal style to your flying Dutchman,
to your protein style,
I Mustard grill them.
I make my own animal styles all the time.
- [Narrator] It will be over two decades
and after Harry Snyder's death
that In-N-Out will grow to even 20 locations.
- [Adam] In-N-Out's legacy is a very, very profound example
that yes, you can make money without sacrificing integrity.
You can grow your brand and grow your footprint
without it growing out of your control.
- [Narrator] While In-N-Out keeps
their drive-through chains small.
Robert Peterson has expanded
to four Jack in the Box restaurants
and has dreams of adding many more.
But by the 1950s,
he will have to compete with more
and more burger spots.
- So at this point in California
you have Carl's Jr. From Anaheim.
You have Bob's Big Boy,
which is like a family friendly diner.
And nationally you have Dairy Queen and A&W,
and these are all in the burger game,
but none of them have drive-throughs.
- [Narrator] McDonald's still just has six locations,
but a man named Ray Kroc has just entered the picture
and is about to take control
and expand McDonald's reach exponentially.
As Jack in the Box faces more competition,
Peterson looks for an edge.
- [Chirag] He realized that the one thing Jack in the Box has
is the drive-through model,
and he wants to make sure
that they're capitalizing on this short window
that they have before anyone else catches up.
- [Brooke] He wants to change up his menu to include foods
that are especially crafted
for the drive-through experience.
- We need something you can hold with a hand on the wheel.
- [Narrator] He lands on an unfamiliar food
to most of America,
the taco.
- [Adam] He ditches the traditional hard shell
uses a soft tortilla,
wraps it around the ingredients and he fries it.
- [Narrator] Jack in the Box's fried taco launches in 1954,
seven years before Taco Bell.
- [Adam C.] Robert Peterson and Jack in the Box
may have made the first taco experience
for millions of Americans
who'd never heard of a taco
before driving through a Jack in the Box.
- [Narrator] It quickly becomes the most popular item
on the menu.
One day selling over half a billion a year.
- [Jason] That's more Big Macs than McDonald's sells
in the year in this country.
That is a wild statistic.
- [Narrator] Over the next decade,
Jack in the Box expands to almost 200 drive-throughs
across the Western US,
with plans to go nationwide.
But by 1965, under the full control of Ray Kroc,
McDonald's has 700 stores coast to coast,
all built around the walk-up design that defined the brand.
But now McDonald's vice president of operations,
Fred Turner, is leading the biggest transformation
in company history.
- [Gary] Fred Turner started off as a fry cook
at Ray Kroc's first McDonald's store
in Des Plaines, Illinois.
Now he was the person in charge
with making Ray's vision a reality.
- McDonald's is investing in a new look.
- [Gary] Ray Kroc's vision was
that McDonald's would be a family-based dine-in restaurant
as opposed to just walk up
and get their burgers and walk away.
- Parents have a place to sit.
The longer they stay,
the more likely the little ones are
to ask for another fry or shake.
- [Erin] They wanna become America's
family gathering place.
So for the first time they plan to add indoor seating
and make the buildings feel more homey,
including adding the mansard style roof.
They even come up with a new golden arches M logo
to make them more recognizable
as people drive down the road.
- But there's still one design element
that's notably missing.
- On your earlier note,
families are on the go.
What if we invested in drive-throughs?
- [Gary] Brent Cameron was the director
of the entire western region,
which was the largest region of McDonald's stores.
- [Bobby] This gives him a unique perspective into trends
that maybe aren't easily observable
at headquarters in Illinois.
- [Narrator] And Cameron's vision
doesn't align with corporate.
- [Bobby] He sees Jack in the Box absolutely crushing it
with their drive-throughs.
- [Brooke] At this time, no other walk-up restaurant
had implemented a drive-through,
but Brent Cameron really thinks
that McDonald's should be the first.
- Eating in the car is a thing of the past.
McDonald's is investing in the future.
- [Bobby] Brent Cameron is confident
that the drive-through is a missed opportunity
for McDonald's,
but it's not a battle that he's won
with his corporate overlords quite yet.
[dramatic music]
[tense dramatic music]
[phone rings]
- [Narrator] By 1968, Robert Peterson looks
to supercharge Jack in the Box expansion
from 1,000 locations to 1,500 in five years.
So he sets up a meeting with a big potential investor,
Ralston Purina.
- For a Jack in the Box franchise 20 is a bit low.
- Ralston Purina is known for its dog and cat food,
but it wants to expand its business into restaurants.
- Oh, oh, okay, let me get back to you.
They're not interested in investing,
20 million for everything.
- [Adam C.] Robert Peterson sells to Ralston Purina for
$20 million.
Which is nearly $200 million by today's standards.
- [Narrator] He'll spend the rest of his life
focused on philanthropy
leaving his protege Jack Goodall in charge.
- [Kate] Jack Goodall started
as a management trainee about five years ago
and he's been groomed by Peterson as his right hand man.
- [Narrator] But despite Ralston Purina's bigger budgets,
Goodall will quickly face hurdles
with the nationwide expansion.
- Jack in the Box is trying to expand eastward
and they're having a lot of problems.
As they expand into more densely populated areas in cities.
They're running into a lot of bureaucratic red tape
and they're also encountering difficulties
in managing an operation that large.
- [Narrator] And now Goodall feels added pressure
to deliver for his new bosses at Purina.
- [Adam C.] Realizing that McDonald's still hasn't
adopted the drive-through yet.
Jack in the Box thought if we have an advantage
at the drive-through, maybe we can scheme new ways
that they can create more customers.
- Chili?
[tense dramatic music]
- Can't eat with a single hand.
[tense dramatic music]
Thank you.
- Pizza.
[tense dramatic music]
- Nah, it's already overdone.
She couldn't find anything more substantial.
- Only thing opened this early.
[tense dramatic music]
- With the fast food universe now becoming this gold rush.
Goodall realizes is that there's really
only one category of food left to pioneer.
[dramatic music]
- [Narrator] In 1969, Jack in the Box
is the first fast food chain
to open early and serve breakfast.
- [Jason] There are people who are driving
to work in the morning,
they're hungry and they don't have time to stop
and sit down to eat breakfast.
- [Adam C.] Jack in the Box thought,
if we have a drive-through,
maybe we can serve an entire part of the day
that had been neglected by the industry.
- [Brooke] It's amazing when you realize
that in the first 20 years of fast food,
nobody thought to serve breakfast.
- [David] And this becomes revolutionary
not just in the fast food industry
but how Americans will eat.
Suddenly we become fast food consumers
morning, midday, and evening.
- [Narrator] As breakfast accelerates
Jack in the Box's sales,
a new challenger emerges in the drive-through space.
Within a year of launching Wendy's,
its founder Dave Thomas
adds drive-throughs to all of his stores.
- [David] Dave Thomas adds to the three point system.
He says you order at the microphone,
you pay at the first window
and you pick up at the second window.
- [Erin] At this point, the pioneers of the drive-through
In-N-Out and Jack in the Box are still drive-through only.
So for the first time ever,
a walk-up restaurant with a counter
and indoor seating also offers a drive-through.
- [Narrator] At the same time,
McDonald's is in the midst
of a massive brand renovation
rolling out at all 1,500 locations.
- [Bobby] It is an absolute behemoth
in the restaurant industry, 1972 hits the $1 billion mark.
And even though they're going through all of the costs
of updating restaurants,
they don't implement a single drive-through.
- [Adam] Ray Kroc felt the idea of a drive-through
sort of undercut this idea
of American family gathering place.
- [Narrator] And one franchise owner is unhappy about it.
- [Erin] David Rich is a McDonald's franchise owner
in Sierra Vista, Arizona,
which is located right next to an army base.
- [Gary] So there's a new regulation that takes effect
that prohibits service members from wearing their uniforms
when they're out in public and in restaurants.
- [David] So they could not go into McDonald's and buy food.
- McDonald's is a walk up ordering process
and that eliminates 40%
of David Rich's business overnight.
- [Narrator] David Rich has submitted
several requests to corporate to add a drive-through,
but he's been ignored.
- [Adam C.] So if you can't feed people during lunch hour,
you can't feed people on their way home from work
who are you gonna feed and when?
- [Adam] Ultimately desperation and maybe a bit of anger,
get the best of Mr. Rich,
and he decides he's putting in a drive-through his own way.
[tense dramatic music]
- [Narrator] David Rich,
the owner of a struggling McDonald's franchise,
has gone completely rogue.
- David Rich decided to buck the system without approval.
He decided to make his own drive-through window.
- It's risky and it's quite frankly a bit crazy as well.
- [Narrator] And now corporate has gotten wind of his stunt.
- Gentlemen, this is David Rich.
Over the years, McDonald's has grown through franchising.
In order to do so,
we have set firm rules for owners to abide by.
Tell them what you've done recently.
- I uh,
I built a drive-through.
- David Rich has broken one of the cardinal rules
of McDonald's franchisees.
- And the results are?
- Sales went up
- How far up?
- Tremendously.
- [Narrator] Since adding a drive-through option
to his store, sales have increased by 40%.
- [Adam C.] Brent Cameron has been advocating for the addition
of the drive-through window
and now David Rich has given him proof that
they actually need the drive-through window
to further improve their business.
- And that's why the future
of McDonald's should be dine-in
and drive-through.
[dramatic music]
- [Bill] McDonald's was an enormous operation
with many layers of bureaucracy
and any kind of decision of this caliber
was like turning a battleship around.
- [Narrator] In 1975,
just one year after Ray Kroc retires,
McDonald's spends millions rolling out the installation
of drive-throughs nationally.
- [Bill] Everybody thinks that McDonald's invented that
when in fact they were one of the latest ones to adopt it.
- [Narrator] That same year,
McDonald's takes their first breakfast sandwich,
the Egg McMuffin nationwide.
- [Gary] By the end of the decade,
McDonald's accounts for 25%
of all breakfasts consumed in the United States.
- [Narrator] Today, McDonald's 27,000 drive-throughs
account for 70% of their $130 billion in global sales.
- [Bobby] What it took for the drive-through
to achieve nationwide acceptance
was the leader in the space.
McDonald's to lead by example.
- [Narrator] But none of this would be possible
without the innovations of In-N-Out
and Jack in the Box.
- Jack in the Box is the unsung hero of the drive-through.
It doesn't get the credit it deserves.
- [Narrator] Today Jack in the Box has nearly 2,200 stores
in 22 states with almost a billion in sales.
- They are a handheld convenient food place.
Quick, easy, tasty, and convenient.
And when you combine that with the advent
of creating a kind of mascot identity,
Jack in the Box is unequivocally
a little orange hatted clown faced pioneer.
[dramatic music]
- [Stacy] Harry Snyder was a real iconoclast.
The little device that he created for In-N-Out
really sparked a revolution
that I'm not even sure he ever understood himself.
- [Narrator] Today, the family business continues its legacy
with In-N-Out boasting 427 locations.
- They've been able to exist
even though they don't have this
incredible nationwide market share
because they have this homegrown brand loyalty.
It is California cuisine.
You know, it's baked in to the culture.
- [Stacy] It is part of the myth of of Southern California,
just like the Hollywood sign or the Palm Tree.
And since not much has really changed with it,
I feel like when you bite into a burger,
kind of feel like you're biting into history.
- [Narrator] The forward-thinking break-throughs
of these brands has now extended beyond the restaurant,
becoming the fabric of our daily routines.
- [Bobby] The concept of the drive-through
has expanded way past fast food.
We're talking laundromats, and banks,
drive-through medical testing facilities.
Even liquor stores are using drive-throughs
- In a world that puts evermore demands on us,
the drive-through really does offer an opportunity
to reclaim a part of our lives,
'cause you can grab things,
you can take it home,
you can sit down with your family.
It changed the game for everyone.