In-N-Out Burger

by Stacy Perman

  Singer Beyoncé Knowles admitted to making an In-N-Out run before the 2007 Academy Awards show. Following the ceremony, Oscar winner Helen Mirren was photographed tucking into an In-N-Out burger in her custom Christian Lacroix gown at Vanity Fair’s post-Oscar party. Since 2001, the magazine’s editor, Graydon Carter, has rented one of In-N-Out’s cookout trailers for the annual fete. “The stand has always been a huge hit,” he explained. “Many of the people who come from the ceremony are ravenous and make straight for the stand. Plus, many of the women have been fasting for weeks to get into the dresses they are wearing.”

  Over the years, the relationship between Hollywood and In-N-Out Burger has only intensified, becoming nearly as much a part of celebrity culture as fan magazines, autographs, or publicity stills. When discussing his favorite places to dine in Los Angeles (for an interview promoting his film Collateral), Tom Cruise listed In-N-Out Burger alongside the longtime hot spot for the well-heeled, Spago. While filming The Green Mile, Tom Hanks rented an In-N-Out cookout trailer for the set. And sly In-N-Out Burger references have found their way into a number of television programs and films from the Coen brothers’ cult hit The Big Lebowski to The Simpsons—all of which prompted the august New York Times to ask, “What’s so hip about a hamburger chain?” on its cultural pages.

  Displaced Californians pine for In-N-Out’s Double-Double burgers; most of them can sing the chain’s radio jingle. “In-N-Out, that’s what a hamburger’s all about,” with greater confidence and accuracy than they can the national anthem. Travelers are known to time their itineraries to hit an In-N-Out during a mealtime, and its most ardent fans enjoy comparing notes on how far they have gone to find an In-N-Out. When British-born Kelly Grant worked as a nanny, she used to take her five-and seven-year-old charges to the In-N-Out Burger by Los Angeles International Airport. Then she would take them across the field where the trio would eat their burgers and plane spot. “It was our favorite thing to do,” she explained.

  In 1999, In-N-Out made international headlines after U.S. army sergeant and Baldwin Park native Andrew Ramirez told a phalanx of reporters that what he craved most after being held as a prisoner of war in Kosovo by Serbian forces for thirty-two days was a Double-Double. Ramirez’s mother, Vivian, made headlines of her own when she flew to see him at his German army base following his release, carrying with her two of the burgers and an order of fries.

  In-N-Out’s fan-customers can usually remember the first time they ate at an In-N-Out much in the same way that most people can remember their first kiss. “I grew up in Detroit,” explained Robert LePlae, the president of advertising agency TBWA/Chiat/Day. “I remember it was on my first trip to California in 1984 on a production shoot. A buddy of mine from college took me to the In-N-Out in Fullerton. A year later I moved to California, and it was the first meal I had off the plane. I thought about In-N-Out Burger all year.”

  In fact, when famed restaurant The French Laundry reached its twelfth anniversary in 2006, its Michelin-starred chef Thomas Keller, a longtime fan, celebrated with his staff by having three hundred In-N-Out burgers and a small mountain of fries delivered to the restaurant. That same year, in something of a tribute, Keller, was photographed in the April issue of Food & Wine magazine sitting at a booth at the Napa Valley In-N-Out wearing one of the chain’s paper cadet hats, the restaurant’s manager sitting across from him.

  Frequently the subject of rumor and speculation, the fastidiously private company has always shunned the kind of publicity that its competitors routinely courted. And while it has rarely bothered to counter or clarify the murmurings, the conjecture has touched on everything from the recipe for its secret sauce to the meaning of the twin palm trees planted in a cross formation at each store—there has even been speculation as to whether the company was run by some kind of Christian cult. Every so often, word that In-N-Out Burger is about to franchise or be sold makes the rounds. While this kind of business gossip has been kicking around for decades, all its customers usually want to know is how soon an In-N-Out Burger will open near them.

  During the sweltering summer of 2006, the rumor mill went into overdrive. In early August, In-N-Out Burger issued a statement announcing that Esther Snyder, who (along with her husband, Harry Snyder) had founded the chain, had died. She was eighty-six years old. Esther’s death left her twenty-four-year-old granddaughter Lynsi Martinez the sole heir to the In-N-Out Burger fortune.

  A petite, unassuming woman, Esther Snyder had spent most of her life determinedly maintaining In-N-Out as a private, family-owned business, keeping it virtually unchanged as decades rolled by. She did so despite countless offers from investment bankers, venture capitalists, private individuals, and large corporations, all of whom were hell-bent on buying into the hugely profitable chain’s unparalleled popularity. Esther Snyder preserved her family’s privacy even as In-N-Out transformed from a single burger stand to a cult phenomenon.

  Her death sparked a round of speculation about the future of the counterintuitive chain that had stridently bucked every industry trend. It was exactly the kind of speculation that had only recently begun to die down. Throughout part of 2005 and much of 2006, an ugly lawsuit played out in Los Angeles Superior Court in which it was alleged that Martinez and her brother-in-law Mark Taylor were plotting a coup to oust Esther from the company. For months, a series of bitterly incriminating charges and counter-charges that included fraud, embezzlement, and boardroom power grabs were hurled back and forth between Martinez and a longtime company executive named Richard Boyd. For the first time in its entire history, the company was subjected to a merciless spotlight, a blast of unwelcome publicity that unveiled a slew of internal tensions and threatened to pull back the curtain on the inner workings of the famously tight-lipped company. As the events unfolded, numerous questions emerged; chief among them: would In-N-Out Burger stay the same?

  CHAPTER 1

  The old In-N-Out Burger stand—a simple red brick structure with a twin-lane drive-through—today stands empty. Occupying a quiet lot on the corner of Francisquito and Garvey avenues in Baldwin Park, “Number One” (as it is commonly known) is surrounded by asphalt and bordered by a short row of windowless, single-story warehouses. Hemmed in on one side by the Interstate 10 freeway and a shopping complex anchored by a giant Target Center on the other, the site of the first In-N-Out is part of history now, closed off to the public by a wrought iron fence, where neat beds of white flowers grow between the bars.

  At one time, on a sliver of the quarter-acre property, there was a pet shop that sold exotic birds. From the start, Harry Snyder was a man who knew how to maximize his opportunities, and oftentimes the company would lease out the unused space at various In-N-Out properties. The small shack nearly hugging the freeway ramp is still there, but it is vacant now. Its weathered green exterior is peeling and the painted lettered sign that reads “Birds? Us” is still visible, although it too has been faded by time.

  Directly across the street from the original store Number One is a large, empty patch of land, a circular expanse of dry earth and scrub weeds enclosed by the curving sweep of the freeway on-ramp. At one time it was home to one of Baldwin Park’s most popular trailer parks. And beyond, fanning out from Garvey Avenue, is a washed-out pink apartment building and a cluster of small ranch houses. Like the shuttered Number One, the scene is a reminder of Baldwin Park as it was before it became just another drowsy suburb of Los Angeles, when its farms and ranches were carved up, sold, and paved over in the postwar boom to make way for the eventual chain stores, strip malls, and tract houses built in their place.

  But in 1948, this was the frontier of the American dream. This was where newly married couples like Harry and Esther Snyder could purchase a spit of land, buy a small house, build an even smaller burger joint—and dream big dreams. Postwar Baldwin Park was the promised land of the working class. Baldwin Park is the spot where In-N-Out Burger began. And it is where the Snyders developed their basic philosophy: serve the fres
hest, highest-quality burgers and fries; treat your employees well and your customers even better, all while providing friendly service in a spanking clean environment; and above all, remain family-owned and independent. That philosophy was the starting point for what would become the fast-food industry. And even as In-N-Out’s competitors later raced around the globe, franchising identical box-like fast-food stores on rows of identical strip malls in nearly identical towns, In-N-Out never wavered from that simple philosophy.

  Across from the old lot on Francisquito Avenue, on the south side of the freeway, stands the new model, single-lane drive-through “Number One.” Opened in 2004, In-N-Out’s hometown flagship is actually the third of the chain’s Number Ones. In 1954, when the state of California expanded the Interstate 10, a stretch of the new freeway came straight up Garvey Avenue, cutting right through the first store—so the Snyders tore down the stand and rebuilt their second “Number One” several feet away.

  Every day, hundreds of motorists whiz by the vacant “Number One” on Francisquito. They are easily confused by the low-hung In-N-Out sign out front. Many mistakenly attempt to turn into the lot before being abruptly confronted with the locked iron gate. Occasionally, however, when the gate is open and nobody is watching, it is possible to steal onto the property and glimpse the spot where In-N-Out began. Baldwin Park’s “old-timers,” as they like to call themselves—those folks who’ve lived here since that first In-N-Out opened—insist that despite its enormous success, not much has changed. “Those burgers taste exactly the same as day one,” they chorus.

  Looking around, it is almost possible to conjure up those early days when the area was just dirt roads and open fields and In-N-Out’s dusty lot was filled with teenagers and their hot rods. Glimpsed through the large glass windows, the open kitchen remains largely intact. The single grill, despite its long retirement, is scrubbed clean and free of grease. The stainless steel beverage dispenser still has paper cups with the familiar red palm tree motif stacked up inside like Russian matryoshka dolls. And the old analog clock tower with the now famous In-N-Out logo, a bright yellow neon boomerang arrow, still keeps time as it clears the grey concrete slab of freeway that slices through the sky behind it.

  That original In-N-Out Burger was once immortalized in a Jack Schmidt painting, reproduced later by the company on T-shirts and postcards; in its portrait, the squat little box of a stand with its red and white awning is offset by a blue sky filled with cumulus clouds. The snow-capped San Gabriel Mountains are in the distance, as are a handful of ranch houses. A parade of old Studebakers with their curved, single-pane windshields, sloped backsides, rear fender skirts, and fat white rim tires are lined up on the gravel drive-through lane. One motorist is shown placing an order in front of a small white box on a pole with the words “Two Way Speaker” written across the side in red letters. And manning the grill inside the open kitchen window is a smiling young man in a crisp white shirt and a paper cadet hat. There is talk that the original site depicted in that postcard will eventually be turned into an In-N-Out museum or that the old kitchen will be donated to a historical society, but nobody knows for certain.

  At first glance, it can be difficult to imagine the role that this simple, unremarkable structure played in helping to reshape the contours of the American lifestyle. The fast-food drive-through has become such an integral part of our culture that it’s almost impossible to imagine American life without it. Perhaps more remarkable still is that while In-N-Out began in the same plebian enclave that hatched today’s monolithic fast-food industry, In-N-Out never developed into just another burger chain. At some point, In-N-Out emerged as something more compelling than a mere fast-food joint. It is nothing less than a cultural institution with a hysterically loyal cult following. Today, In-N-Out is as much a part of Southern California as the Hollywood sign or the graceful palm trees that line the streets of Los Angeles.

  And yet, only the most basic of details are known about the origins and inner workings of In-N-Out Burger. The highly secretive Snyder family and their enigmatic little burger chain have always preferred to let their hamburgers speak for them. And so for some sixty years, it has stood at the curious public intersection of being both widely loved and little known. Camera shy and fiercely independent, In-N-Out has managed to preserve an inscrutable charm. Over time, that homespun charm has transformed into a hoary aura of mystique.

  Yet an entire industry was influenced and an American icon was born when Harry Snyder, the gruff, self-made son of Dutch immigrants, first set eyes on Esther Johnson, a shy former schoolteacher with a gentle smile and a head for numbers. When they met, America was a different country, and Harry Snyder—an uncomplicated man with sharp instincts—had quickly sensed a hunger for a new way of doing things. The Snyders didn’t invent the hamburger or even the fast-food hamburger chain; the couple discovered an entirely new market that was based on a new and changing America. Of course as is the case in many stories of American ingenuity, the Snyder’s fortunes were, in part, built on the dreams of others.

  At eight-thirty on a chilly grey morning in April 1906, Harry Snyder’s father, Hendrick Schneider, having earlier made his way to the soggy English port of Liverpool from his native Amsterdam, joined a colorful parade of passengers streaming aboard the SS Laurentian. At thirty-five years old, the sturdy, brown-eyed, dark-haired Dutchman joined Jewish-Russian peddlers, Finnish farmers, Scottish tradesmen, and clusters of other Dutchmen who were all making their way to Nova Scotia.

  The Laurentian was part of the Allan Line Royal Mail Steamship Company Ltd.; Allan’s fleets, setting sail from Glasgow and Liverpool, were said to have ferried more young immigrants across the Atlantic than any other shipping company. A brochure from the era proclaimed that its steamers sailed “at fares so low as to be within the reach of almost any working man.”

  And so, under a gunpowder sky, the Laurentian edged its way down the River Mersey. Hendrick “Harry” Schneider* and his fellow passengers were no doubt filled to bursting with excitement and nervous anticipation as the ship made its way to the Irish Sea before entering the billowy, cerulean expanse of the Atlantic Ocean. As Harry’s father—a painter by trade—sailed to Canada, he surely shared the dream that had spurred so many others to leave their homes, their families, and all that they had known behind them in Europe.

  At the turn of the century, when Snyder père departed Amsterdam, he left a city in upheaval. As Schneider sailed westward, Europe at his back, Amsterdam was undergoing cataclysmic change, engulfed in riots, suffering food and housing shortages, and plagued by rampant unemployment. Schneider was just one of many European immigrants who were pouring into Canada’s capacious western territories—billed as the “Last, Best, West.” After landing in Nova Scotia, Hendrick did indeed head west. He moved first to Regina, Saskatchewan, before settling in Vancouver, British Columbia. In Vancouver, he found work in the shipyards as a painter.

  Some three years later, in 1909, Hendrick married Mary (née Droewde), a thirty-two-year-old Dutch immigrant. Mary’s mother reputedly came from an old wealthy Dutch family; when she married a poor diamond cutter, she was disowned, leaving Mary to grow up in something less than the comfort that her mother had known as a child. She arrived in Canada with her sister and brother and (like Hendrick) they became part of a group of Dutch émigrés who lived and worked together in a close-knit community, often moving around in search of work. One of their destinations turned out to be across the border in Washington.

  Over the next several years, Mary followed her husband back and forth between Vancouver and Seattle as Hendrick—who spoke broken English at best—took various painting jobs. In 1910, while living in Seattle, Mary gave birth to the couple’s first child: a daughter, Lillian. Hendrick was working as a house painter, and the couple’s fortunes were modest. However, by 1912, the Schneider family had once again returned to Vancouver, and Hendrick to the Vancouver shipyards. It was there that Mary gave birth to the couple’s second child, a d
aughter they named Harriet. And a year later, on September 9, 1913, Harry Jr. was born.

  When World War I broke out in 1914, Schneider had difficulty finding work in Canada. A victim of wartime prejudice, Schneider found that his name and accent were often mistaken for German, and he changed the family name to Snyder. Fearing that a German victory would further hamper his opportunities, he decided to leave Canada for good.

  On September 24, 1915, when Harry fils was barely two years old, the Snyders sailed to Seattle. According to immigration records, Hendrick carried one hundred dollars in his pocket, a not inconsiderable sum at the time. The Snyders moved into a small house in the Fauntleroy neighborhood that faced Vashon Island and the Olympic Mountains. “By today’s standards, the house wasn’t much,” recalled Harry many years later. “But in those days it was nice. I used to sleep in an empty chicken coop in the backyard. It was close to the beach. We could walk down there and swim or go boating right on the Sound.”

  The family slipped into a routine; Hendrick painted and Mary worked as a housecleaner. A census taker at the time noted that while Dutch was the couple’s native tongue, both Hendrick and Mary could read and write English—in reality, the couple had learned only rudimentary English. This may be the reason that their young son Harry could not speak anything but gibberish until he was six years old.

  When the Snyders settled in Seattle, it was a spit of a city in the midst of rapid expansion, nestled between the Puget Sound and Lake Washington. The gold rush of the 1890s had spurred a massive migration, and with it came huge growth. Emblematic of Seattle’s progress was the Smith Tower; completed a year before the Snyders left Canada, the Tower was the tallest building west of the Mississippi River until the Space Needle eclipsed it in 1962. The Snyders’ arrival coincided with the creation of many of the city’s neighborhoods that began to fan out from the densely crowded downtown area. Seattle was a city of growth, offering an environment in which many tried their hand at the new, the untested, and the novel.