Exclusive: Raising Cane's wants to open a restaurant in Vacaville
If approved, Vacaville would be the first city in Solano County with the southern-style chicken fingers restaurant.
(Photo: A Raising Cane’s restaurant in Louisiana. Officials are hoping to build a similar restaurant in Vacaville. Courtesy image, Graphic by Solano NewsNet)
If all goes well, Vacaville could become the first city in Solano County to host a new chicken fingers restaurant.
Late last year, Louisiana-based Raising Cane’s took the first step toward building a new restaurant in Vacaville with a letter submitted to the city’s community development department, according to documents reviewed by Solano NewsNet.
If approved, the restaurant would be located on Nut Tree Parkway in a building that formerly occupied the Applebee’s Bar & Grill restaurant. That restaurant closed early last year, and the building has been vacant ever since.
Developers are seeking to demolish the old Applebee’s restaurant and construct a new, 3,200-square foot building that would allow for a mixture of indoor and outdoor dining. The restaurant would also have a double lane-style drive thru that could accommodate nearly two dozen cars at once, developers said.
“This drive-thru restaurant is expecting to serve 1,500 customers per day,” Chet Rusit, a project manager for PM Design Group, wrote in an October 2020 letter to the city.
Rusit said the restaurant expected to employ around 55 full- and part-time workers, with 16 workers per shift. The restaurant would open around 9 a.m. every day and close somewhere between 1:30 a.m. and 3:30 a.m. depending on the day.
(Image: Proposed rendering of the Raising Cane’s restaurant that could open in Vacaville as early as next year. Courtesy image, Graphic by Solano NewsNet)
In a statement provided to Solano NewsNet, a spokesperson for Raising Cane’s said the Vacaville restaurant could open as early as 2022 once the permit process is completed. As of December, the company’s request for a conditional use permit to construct the new restaurant was being reviewed by the city’s planning commission.
In addition to the Vacaville location, Raising Cane’s is hoping to open between 20 and 30 more restaurants throughout Northern California within the next two years. Locations have already been identified for restaurants in Davis, Elk Grove and Citrus Heights, and some of those restaurants could open later this year. Additional proposed spots are being scouted in the Stockton, Modesto and Fresno areas.
Raising Cane’s started in 1996 with a single location in Louisiana. It now has over 500 locations across the country, though it only recently expanded to Northern California.
The restaurant offers a limited menu of chicken fingers and chicken sandwiches along with coleslaw, Texas-style toast, lemonade and sodas.
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