Wikimedia Commons The last Burger Chef location closed in 1996.
- Burger Chef once had almost as many stores as McDonald's.
- Its founders manufactured automatic shake machines, soft-serve ice cream machin, and flame broilers for fast-food chains, patenting the flame broiler in 1954.
- Burger Chef was also the first to serve kids' meals that bundled a burger, dessert, and toy.
- But the chain expanded very quickly, and hundreds of stores closed throughout the 1970s and 1980s. It was purchased by Hardee's in 1982, with the last location closing in 1996.
McDonald's is well known for its Happy Meal, but it wasn't the first to serve a bundled kids' meal.
In the 1960s and early 1970s, McDonald's had a major competitor: Burger Chef, a hamburger chain that started in 1958.
The chain was originally created by Donald and Frank Thomas, whose father started the General Equipment Company in the 1930s to manufacture machinery for fast-food restaurants. Some of the products General Equipment made included soft-serve ice cream machines and flame-broiling equipment, which it patented in 1954, according to Eater.
In 1957, the Thomas brothers decided to open a demonstration store to show how to best use the products. It became so successful that the brothers opened a number of others throughout the state. Using McDonald's as its inspiration, Burger Chef officially opened up as a restaurant in Indianapolis in 1958.
One Reddit user described Burger Chef as "a Dairy Queen burger with a salad bar you could pick from to load on top of it. Imagine a fast food restaurant with the appeal of a bowling alley without lanes and the taste of high school cafeteria and you get a clearer idea." Another wrote, "the burger was similar to a McDonald's hamburger, really nothing fancy or special, but recalling the experience I can actually taste the hamburger which I thoroughly enjoyed."
Burger Chef was also the first restaurant chain to serve a burger-fries-drink combo, called the "Triple Threat", which cost just 45 cents, according to Time. It also pioneered "The Works Bar," where customers could dress their own burgers with toppings and condiments.
In 1967, Burger Chef was purchased by General Foods for $16 million. By 1969, it had 1,000 restaurants.
While Burger Chef was at its peak, it introduced a concept most people associate with McDonald's: the kids' meal. In 1973, the "Fun Meal" was the first fast-food meal to bundle burgers with a dessert and a toy. It also had a mascot and cartoon characters, including a magician named Burgerini and a vampire named Count Fangburger. In 1978, the chain partnered with "Star Wars" to create seven different kids' meals.
When McDonald's introduced its Happy Meal in 1979, Burger Chef sued on claims the rival chain had appropriated the idea of the Fun Meal. Shortly after, in 1981, Burger Chef sued Burger King over its "Fun School Meal," but settled out of court when Burger King acknowledged Burger's Chef's trademark, according to the Indianapolis Star.
Burger Chef was struggling by this point. General Foods had expanded the chain very quickly, and hundreds of stores had closed throughout the 1970s.
In 1982, Hardee's bought the remaining 260 stores for $44 million, and almost all of Burger Chef's restaurants were closed or turned into Hardee's.
The final Burger Chef franchise, located in Cookeville, Tennessee, closed in 1996.
