Big Changes Coming at Cheba Hut
As I alluded to in yesterday's blog, you miss Colorado when you're somewhere else. So, it'll be nice when you can still get a Sticky Icky, Panama Red, or (my favorite) Magic Mushroom Pinner, when you're far away from home, in a place that otherwise feels like a different planet. (Yes, like Oklahoma.)
Scott Jennings, owner and founder of Cheba Hut restaurants, says "If you're not growing, you're dying." So, when investors started calling him with offers because they noticed his establishments collectively took in over $25 million in sales in 2016, he decided that taking his chain national will be the right thing to do.
Other reasons Jennings gives for the imminent expansion are "in order for us to take care of our customers and our employees, which we believe are the same thing," and what he calls "The Green Bubble," which refers to the current, unprecedented commercial popularity of marijuana, upon which the restaurant bases its menu and its personality.
He adds that we should expect more than double the current number of Cheba Huts within the next three years. It already exists in Oregon, California, Nevada, Arizona, and New Mexico, in addition to having Colorado locations in Dillon, Longmont, Boulder, Denver, and its two locations in Fort Collins.
You never know what kind of music will be playing at Cheba Hut. I'll never forget the time it was the only restaurant open near College & Laurel, because it was Easter Sunday. Next thing I knew, my wife, girls, sister-in-law, and I, all dressed to the 9's, were chowing down while Sepultura blasted out the speakers. (It's unapologetically barbaric metal from the '90s, if you're not familiar.) I was the only one at the table who knew the artist and song, because I still own some of that band's material. And my tribe was cool enough to appreciate it, too.