Chicken Salad Chick, the popular chicken salad chain which earlier this year officially moved its headquarters from Auburn, Alabama to metro Atlanta, has secured space for what will be its 34th location in Georgia. According to newly updated property materials, Chicken Salad Chick will open a new location along Dallas Highway in West Cobb at the Parkside West Cobb shopping center. The new Chicken Salad Chick will open in the 2,800 square foot space left vacant last year when original tenant Zoës Kitchen closed.
Despite the pandemic, Chicken Salad Chick opened new Atlanta area locations last year in Johns Creek, Loganville and Snellville, and also added a Buford location near the Mall of Georgia this past January. Overall, the company opened 37 locations in 2020 with plans to add about 40 more in 2021. The Snellville location, which occupies a former Wendy's, gave the fast casual chain a drive-thru, a feature Tom Carr, the company's Chief Marketing Officer tells ToNeTo Atlanta is now present in 38% of the chain's 188 restaurants.
Zoës Kitchen, which was purchased by fellow quick-serve chain Cava in 2018, closed not only the West Cobb unit last year but also outposts in East Cobb, Sandy Springs and Johns Creek too. The Johns Creek location on Medlock Bridge Road reopened earlier this year as Gao Fresh Noodle while the East Cobb and Sandy Springs units remain empty... for now. It's unlikely that the former Zoës in East Cobb or Sandy Springs will be appealing to Chicken Salad Chick given their proximity to existing locations, but the growing chicken salad chain could have interest in other units in other markets as Cava continues to shutter select Zoës locations.
The West Cobb Chicken Salad Chick is expected to open later this summer and will follow an earlier planned opening in Thomasville. Depending on how timing and construction works out, the West Cobb location could be the chain's 200th, which would mean an exciting and special celebratory opening!
In addition to Thomasville and West Cobb, Chicken Salad Chick has plans later this year to add new restaurants in Fayetteville, Bethlehem, LaGrange and at the new Perimeter Marketplace along Ashford Dunwoody Road in Dunwoody. A location being scouted for Dawsonville could follow in late 2021 or early 2022.
A previously "temporarily closed" Chicken Salad Chick at Sandy Plains Centre in East Cobb will not reopen.
Georgia, with 32 Chicken Salad Chick restaurants open and what may be 40 by early next year, is now, and will remain, the company's largest market by store count. The company currently sees average unit volume (AUV) of about $1.1 million and has about 800,000 members of its "Craving Credits" rewards app.
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