In-N-Out Burger

by Stacy Perman

  The media attention certainly helped to generate a new level of interest in the small regional chain, but nothing gave it more publicity (or sales) then its own longtime customers. Staying simple and remaining focused on its core values had allowed In-N-Out to stay true to its loyal fan base. And it was precisely those customers who often did the heavy lifting, frequently boasting about their zealous affection for the chain to everybody else. Regulars (who almost always ordered off of the secret menu) engaged in an ongoing contest, trying to outdo each other on how many hamburgers they could eat at any one time. Colorado native Duke Sherman proudly recounted the episode that occurred when he was studying for final exams at Occidental College in Eagle Rock, a northeastern Los Angeles neighborhood. “Four of my dorm mates—two football players, a violinist, and a rugby player—decided we would make In-N-Out history,” was how his story began. The plan was to head to the nearest In-N-Out in Pasadena, about five miles from campus, and each attempt to consume twenty-five Double-Doubles in one hour. “We made quite a scene that night as we ordered and ate with great fervor,” he recalled years later, after moving to New York and launching his own consulting firm. “I think we would have been more successful had the staff not provided free fries to help get us in the spirit. But the bacchanal did not last long, and we set no records. We left In-N-Out men that night, men who were complete, men who were nauseous.”

  Such ignominious tales of ingenuity and one-upmanship reached an apogee many years later on Halloween night in 2004, when a group of eight San Francisco friends famously ordered and finished a 100 x 100 (one hundred beef patties and one hundred slices of cheese) at a Las Vegas In-N-Out. The tab for the monster cheeseburger: $97.66.

  The swapping of stories about the lengths to which one would go in order to eat at an In-N-Out further fueled the chain’s mystique. Richard Clark, the owner of Clark Copper Head Gaskets in Minneapolis, boasted of paying over one hundred dollars in freight to fly forty Double-Doubles from the Ontario In-N-Out for his son’s twenty-first birthday. A former dragster, Clark ate his first In-N-Out burger in 1971 while he was on the circuit and still gets misty-eyed when he talks about the chain. “They’re just the greatest hamburgers ever made,” he trilled. “Whenever I fly into California, I get the rental car and then go to the In-N-Out. Even before I check into my hotel room, I’ll eat a couple of Double-Doubles at one sitting. If I’m there five days, I eat one every day.” Clark sighed, adding: “My son-in-law is out West, and when he goes to In-N-Out he’ll call me and say: ‘Hey I’m eating a Double-Double,’ and hang up just to piss me off.”

  As its competitors looked on with envy, the chain’s regulars assumed the responsibility of bringing in a constant stream of new devotees, an act generally referred to as “the conversion.” The deed had the feel of bestowing membership into a club that seemed at once exclusive and egalitarian.

  The prototypical conversion story goes something like this: “I was one of the converts,” proclaimed Angela Courtin, a marketing executive in Los Angeles. “I moved here from Texas. My brother was already here, and he said, ‘You have to try In-N-Out.’ After that, I started going once a week. I love the simplicity of the menu, and it’s fresh. A friend of a friend let me in on the secret menu. After that, I felt I must pass this on and tell other newbies—and I’ve done that for numerous people. Actually, I feel it’s akin to my civic duty. I’ve always said that In-In-Out is the perfect blend of communism and democracy. There are limited choices, but it is an entrepreneurial family business. It is the great class equalizer. Look inside! You get everybody here: middle-class skateboarders and Beverly Hills ladies, ethnic families and day laborers, all eating in the same restaurant, at the same price point, and with the same three options.”

  Master chef and American food pioneer Julia Child, a California native, counted herself a longtime fan. Nancy Verde Barr, Child’s friend and assistant, wrote fondly in her own memoir, Backstage with Julia: My Years with Julia Child, about the day when the two “gobbled down Double-Double burgers at the In-N-Out drive-through” near Child’s Santa Barbara home. Indeed, the woman whose kitchen was eventually displayed in the Smithsonian Institution was said to carry a list of store locations in her pocketbook.

  A Hollywood favorite from its first days, In-N-Out had in the intervening years become as much a part of celebrity culture as autographs or the red carpet. Without losing any of its homespun appeal, the burger chain’s popularity among the in-crowd was entirely the result of a wide swath of celebrities who regularly talked it up. “When I first joined the band, we must have eaten there at least three days a week,” recalled rocker Sammy Hagar, who signed up as the front man for Van Halen in 1985. “We were in the studio recording 5150, and we’d send someone to go get food, and we’d talk about sushi or pizza and always end up with In-N-Out.” Gordon Ramsay, the British celebrity chef with twelve Michelin stars, global fame, and profanity-laced rants, once admitted to sitting down for a Double-Double and then “minutes later I drove back ’round and got the same thing again to take away.” PGA golf champ Phil Mickelson mentioned the chain so often that whenever he fell into a losing streak, sportswriters began suggesting that he cut back on the Double-Doubles.

  Before long, tourists got wind of In-N-Out Burger and began making their own pilgrimages to what was considered the quintessential Southern California attraction. Fans passed the secret menu on to one another and described the sublime pleasures of tucking into an Animal Style cheeseburger. Vegetarians talked up the chain’s off-menu Grilled Cheese. Expatriate Californians pined for their favorite burger, and In-N-Out T-shirts were the epitome of cool. Analysts spoke of In-N-Out’s “uncopyable advantage,” while everybody else talked about its unparalleled cult following. According to William Martin, the Snyders and the rest of the chain’s highest echelon were definitely conscious of the mystique that had developed around In-N-Out. “They were all aware of it, and they loved it,” he said. “But they had no explanation for it.” That didn’t mean, however, that they didn’t know how use it.

  In another radical departure from Harry, Rich began implementing a more aggressive approach to marketing the chain. In 1977, only a year after he took over, Rich launched In-N-Out’s first television commercial. The brief animated spot featured a cowboy astride a horse riding up to an In-N-Out and ordering a Double-Double. Under Rich, the chain launched a radio jingle with the catchy refrain: “In-N-Out, In-N-Out, that’s what a hamburger is all about,” and it fast became something of a Southern California anthem. Despite the high-voltage marketing, Rich was careful to ensure that its message—like the company itself—remained focused on the product. It did not, as had become commonplace among its competitors, revolve around some kind of manufactured experience. Before long, a pair of new slogans, “Quality You Can Taste” and “Cleanliness You Can See,” appeared. Consumers felt a connection with In-N-Out’s simple, almost quaint brand, and it was clear that Rich knew the value in preserving that.

  For some time, In-N-Out’s signature logo had served as an important advertising feature. Echoing the days when roadside diners attracted travelers with their kitschy neon architecture, In-N-Outs strategically placed along freeway off-ramps served much the same purpose. The yellow boomerang arrow was a beacon for weary and hungry travelers. As it turned out, In-N-Out’s real estate was one of its best marketing strategies. Continuing with that theme and playing up its roots as a drive-through, the chain began printing up maps pinpointing stores and their addresses for its customers. In time, In-N-Out produced a compact, pocket-sized location booklet, later setting up a toll-free number. In addition to asking questions about everything from the amount of fat in a cheeseburger (twenty-seven grams) to what kind of oil the french fries are fried in (100 percent vegetable oil), drivers on the road could call in and tell an operator where they were and be directed to the nearest In-N-Out. (That feature was updated in later years when In-N-Out installed a map finder on its website that plotted all the In-N-Out stores in any given
location.)

  Reaching back to In-N-Out’s early days when roadside diners were exploding and transforming the landscape, the chain deployed a deceptively simple billboard strategy that traded heavily on the chain’s postwar image. Intentionally placing the large signs on streets leading to an In-N-Out, they often said little more than “In-N-Out Burger 2.5 Miles Ahead.” Usually the billboards were accompanied by a three-dimensional, oversized replica of a Double-Double. When an ad agency came up with the idea to tempt drivers further by having artificial steam rise from the burger, Rich eagerly signed on.

  One of In-N-Out’s most successful marketing strategies came in the form of bumper stickers. In Southern California, starting in the early 1980s, placing an In-N-Out sticker on the back of one’s car signified membership in a peculiar sort of club; all along the freeways, horns were honked, thumbs were raised, and heads were tipped in recognition.

  At one point, it became common practice among young men across the Southland to excise the “B” and “R” from the word B-U-R-G-E-R, modifying the sticker to read “IN-N-OUT URGE”; the clean-cut company was not amused. As a result, the chain discontinued the original sticker and printed up a new one. This time a well-placed image of a Double-Double was placed on the spot where the word “burger” once stood.

  In 1984, Rich used the widespread popularity of the chain’s bumper stickers to launch one of In-N-Out’s largest and most successful promotional initiatives: a chain-wide sweepstakes contest. During several month-long periods, In-N-Out gave away its sought-after bumper stickers, and spotters were instructed to jot down the license plate numbers of cars bearing the chain’s stickers. The numbers were then entered into a series of drawings. Prizes included trips to Hawaii, microwave ovens, video recorders, and In-N-Out T-shirts. Advertised on billboards all over the greater Los Angeles area, customers helped the campaign with a grassroots effort of their own, passing the word along. In a town built on dreams, cars, and sunshine, the promotion became one of those curious Los Angeles cultural events wherein eating a burger might win you a moment of fame and a trip to the beaches of Waikiki. (Decades later, buttons and other ephemera from the original sweepstakes were sold on eBay)

  The promotion combined two of Los Angeles’s cultural icons (hamburgers and cars), played up In-N-Out’s core values, and was relatively inexpensive to put on. It also packed an incredible public relations wallop. As the trade publication Nation’s Restaurant News marveled at the time, “The burger Goliaths doing business in Southern California must surely envy the kind of hometown customer enthusiasm which can turn little David in the form of In-N-Out into a self-advertising car cult.”

  On its home turf, simply through word of mouth and bumper stickers, In-N-Out had become as well-known as Disneyland or McDonald’s. Reported estimates on In-N-Out’s advertising budget ranged from $1 million annually, increasing later to between $5 and $10 million—a drop in the bucket compared to the budgets of its fast-food rivals, who routinely poured hundreds of millions of dollars into their own yearly campaigns. With a continual demand for In-N-Out’s burgers, the chain had little need for the kind of sophisticated multiplatform campaigns that its rivals regularly employed. In-N-Out relied on its radio jingle and the infrequent television commercial (usually broadcast on cable). Astonishingly, its billboards, bumper stickers, T-shirts, and its own rabid fans seemed to broadcast the message to great effect. Without corporate solicitation, a roster of celebrity names regularly endorsed the chain.

  Straightforward and uncomplicated, the chain’s marketing efforts really added up to an awareness campaign that casually reminded people about In-N-Out. As Robert LePlae, the president of TBWA/Chiat/Day, the advertising giant behind memorable campaigns for Levi’s, Taco Bell, and Apple Computer, acknowledged, “Their marketing is really brilliant. The best marketing is word of mouth, and they have that. You can’t get that through traditional media.” Moreover, LePlae was full of praise for the simple fact that In-N-Out hadn’t sold its soul. “They don’t abuse the privilege that they have built up with their customers.” While heading up the agency’s Los Angeles office between 2001 and 2005, the self-confessed In-N-Out fan—who fondly recalled ordering cookout trailers for big agency parties and taking out-of-town clients to In-N-Out—says he learned to master the art of the “one hand on the steering wheel and the other one on the Double-Double.” “They haven’t commercialized the secret menu,” he enthused. “There is a powerful trust between the company and the customers that is deeply ingrained. I’m not sure if it was intentional, but it is not the kind of thing a big, massive company could do. They would merchandise every little thing.”

  While In-N-Out’s profile rose considerably, the Snyders remained guarded, at least publicly. Rich clearly saw the importance of press coverage, but stayed somewhat wary of the media. The chain adamantly refused to discuss its operating strategies or sales figures, hewing literally to the meaning of the phrase “private, family-owned company.” Unlike the owners of many other successful businesses, the Snyders did not relish the idea of having their portrait on the cover of Fortune magazine or their benchmarks featured in the Wall Street Journal. Perhaps naively, the chain did not want to come across as if it were actually seeking publicity.

  Indeed, in an increasingly solipsistic industry, In-N-Out remained the exception and not the rule. Take the example of Dave Thomas, the founder of Wendy’s Old-Fashioned Hamburgers (and a former Kentucky Fried Chicken franchisee). Starting at the tail end of the 1980s, Thomas became his chain’s TV pitchman. After appearing in over eight hundred commercials between 1989 and 2002, Dave Thomas became a household name. At one point, Wendy’s conducted a survey, the results of which claimed that 90 percent of all Americans knew who Thomas was—more than could identify the prime minister of England. But back in California, there were few who couldn’t recognize the tell-tale symbols of In-N-Out. In fact, although “In-N-Out” is not printed on the chain’s beverage cups, one would be hard-pressed to find a Californian who couldn’t recognize the brand from the red silhouetted palm tree design.

  Rich, who had earlier posed for Forbes with a big smile on his face and a Double-Double in his hand, later was said to have had misgivings about the display. Specifically, in a world in which McDonald’s proudly announced to the world that it had sold “billions of burgers,” the magazine reported that In-N-Out sold fifty-two thousand burgers per month. It was a slip Rich quickly came to regret. A year earlier, in 1988, he had told the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, that he hoped to sell 27 million burgers in 1989. In retrospect, Rich thought it smacked of braggadocio and, perhaps worse, it made In-N-Out Burger sound like every other fast-food place. In the future, there would be scant public mention of how many burgers In-N-Out had sold.

  As the years wore on, the family retreated further from the spotlight. Increasingly, they pushed Carl Van Fleet, the vice president of operations, into the role of In-N-Out’s spokesperson. It was a position that mostly consisted of offering firm but polite “no comments” and other genial but equally opaque statements. On occasion, Rich broke his press silence—however, this happened infrequently. Esther Snyder was rarely (if ever) heard from publicly when it came to discussing the chain, and Guy Snyder even less.

  In describing the chain’s rather cool attitude toward publicity, Carl Van Fleet once explained, “We aren’t striving to become a household name.”

  Although it was most likely unintentional, this enigmatic quality added a definite layer of intrigue to the chain. It was a lesson the Snyders took to heart. As In-N-Out’s onetime chief financial officer Steve Tanner once said, “If you have to tell somebody you’re something, you’re probably not.”

  CHAPTER 14

  As In-N-Out Burger continued to grow and prosper, Rich found himself turning closer toward religion. He had come to the conclusion that God was behind the success of his business and religious devotion was the way to a better world. For him, business, religion, and politics overlapped. Already a believer, personal
events had increasingly propelled him further toward religion. Harry’s illness was a seminal event. Earlier, while traveling by plane with his father from Mexico where Harry was receiving treatment for his lung cancer, Rich prayed with him to receive Jesus. Then sometime around 1983, Rich was born again as a Christian. “He gave his life to the Lord,” explained his cousin Bob Meserve, “and everything turned around from that point forward.”

  It was a slightly different spiritual orientation from the one that existed in the Snyder home while Rich and Guy were growing up. Although Harry held to traditional values, he didn’t seem to feel much of a need for organized religion. As Harry’s cancer progressed, however, he too had become more religious. According to his nephew, “On his death bed, he received the Lord.”

  Raised as a Free Methodist, Esther always maintained a deep and abiding faith. She believed that religion was a private and personal affair. Said to almost always carry a Bible with her, Esther didn’t care what religion others espoused and she didn’t always attend church, but she did believe in God. While interviewing his mother for a home movie about her life, at one point Rich asked Esther what her favorite subject in school was, to which she replied “science.” Rich, who was off-camera, seemed startled by her answer. Retorting with some incredulity, he remarked, “You believe in God and you still enjoyed science?” Looking straight into the camera, her eyes widening, Esther barely hesitated. “Sure,” she replied. “Even Darwin believed.”

  For his part, Guy Snyder considered himself to be a Christian at heart, although spiritual salvation just wasn’t central to his life—but when he traveled, he liked to visit different churches. The brothers’ differing levels of religious commitment and faith was just one more line of separation that pushed them ever further apart.