North Palm Beach, Florida-based BurgerFi is coming to Brookhaven. The new burger joint will open at TOWN Brookhaven and join numerous other chain restaurants. BurgerFi will open adjacent to Swirll frozen yogurt and across from the recently shuttered Stir Crazy. The restaurant will be about 1200 square feet and will likely feature both indoor and outdoor dining.
This November, the chain is also opening at Emory Point on Clifton Road.
TOWN Brookhaven has proven to be not the most succesful of restaurant locations and has even earned the designation as a "food court" amongst readers of this blog and neighbors in the area. Atlanta-based Boneheads Grilled Fish & Piri Piri Chicken is also opening a location at TOWN Brookhaven. If comments left on a previous posting on Boneheads' opening is any indication of their success, they better prepare for a short run.
Brookhaven does have plenty of young professionals as well as higher income older individuals, but the number of chain eateries at TOWN Brookhaven is a turnoff to many. Many prefer the breadth of local options on Dresden, including local favorites Kaleidoscope and Haven. Others would sooner drive the couple miles to Buckhead than be forced to such generic chain offerings.
In its defense, BurgerFi does claim to offer a natural/hormone free burger and fresh cut fries. I'd like to give them the benefit of the doubt, but on a recent trip to New York, I happened upon a similar concept called BRGR, and both the burgers and fries came out of frozen baggies and were awful tasting. While the meat may have been hormone free and organic, there is something to be said for freshly prepared meat and fries that are cooked/cut to order. Atlanta-based Farm Burger is a great example of a burger joint that lives up to the expectations in its promotional materials. Everything is fresh and you can taste the difference.
Let's be clear though: I have not yet tried BurgerFi and cannot know what they actually bring to your table or how fresh their food is. What I will say, is that it's hard to maintain quality and freshness the bigger a chain you become. To that end, I recently spoke with a reader who loved BGR, a Virginia-based burger joint, when she lived in in Virginia. Having now visited their new, franchised, Atlantic Station location, she hates it and will likely not return.
There are no burger joints in or around TOWN Brookhaven other than McDonald's, so let's hope they do have a great product and fair pricing. If they do, they may turn out to be one of the few restaurant success stories to come out of the project.
BurgerFi is supposedly planning six additional locations, four in Alpharetta and two in Athens near UGA in the coming months. Plans call for as many as 15 locations overall in the state over the next three years.
Tampa, Florida-based Burger 21 and Lansdowne, Virginia-based BGR The Burger Joint are both entering the Atlanta market as well. Burger 21 has two locations planned thus far, north Alpharetta and near The Mall of Georgia in Buford. BGR has one location open at Atlantic Station and plans more.
What do you think of the BurgerFi concept? What would you like to see opened in TOWN Brookhaven? Who do you think has the weakest concept?
Share your thoughts in the comment section below.
ps, While at TOWN Brookhaven I spoke with management at Costco and was told the sought after-asked about-and much needed gas station will be breaking ground in the coming weeks. Costco has a commitment from their construction company to have the station open BEFORE the holiday rush. **Cross your fingers**