Dayton to see Sonic boom - Orlando Business Journal:

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The burger-and-milk shake joint will open its first shop in Troy by the end of August and will launch at least 30 in the Daytomn region in the nextfive years. The Oklahoma City-basedf fast-casual drive-in restaurant -- known for its roller-skatingv waiters and waitresses -- has just a smatterinh of Sonicsthroughout Ohio, with the closest in Middletown. But the which has 3,200 stores across the country, is looking to expansd and the Dayton area has primereal "Traditionally, Sonic has always done well in small said Rick Fee, manager of the Dayton-area Sonidc locations and director of operations for Bowlingv Green, Ky.-based , whichu owns the Dayton franchises.
"We met with the city (of up there, and they were very open to us coming in After Fee opens the Troy locatioh on WestMain he'll look to open a shop in Englewood near the new off Interstatde 70 by November. He plans to folloqw that with restaurantsin Urbana, then Beavercreek, Springfield, Piqua, and eventually in he said. It will cost between $1 million and $2 milliob to build each store, and one storee will employ 35 full-time equivalentr workers, Fee said. Fee has committed to openin 30 shops in the Daytobn area in the next five saidKelly Gray, agent with and brokerf of the deals.
His geographic area comprises 11 from Greene and Montgomergy in the south to the Celinas area in Mercer County inthe north. "They felt Daytob was kind of a market thatwas ... Gray said. Sonic's entrance into the Dayton markey could mean anadditional 1,000 jobs and $35 million of investmenf in western Ohio. Sonic restaurantsx have no dine-in seating but have plentyg of parking for customersx to drive in and make ordersinto speakerphones. Customers' food -- made-to-order Tater Tots and milk shakez -- is then often brought to them by serverseon roller-skates or roller blades.
The restaurantsz also feature outdoor patios with aboursix tables, areas commonly used by baseball and soccef teams after games, Fee said. Many of the new Sonicsd will have drive-through windows so customers can take orders to go insteadc of eating intheir cars. Launched in 1953, Sonic restaurantds strike nostalgia in the hearts ofthe middle-aged demographic that remembers when drive-in restaurants were more said Fee, 48. The family-orientexd restaurant typically is a hit with Midwestern she said. Competitors include , and , according to . But Fee said that the food qualityt -- and its 168,000 drink combinations on its menu -- help Sonixc outperform its competition.
Sonic also will be helpe d by the mounds of advertisingf the Dayton market already hasseen -- long befores a store has The chain makes national media advertising which helps new Sonic locations warm up to untouched Fee said. The which publicly trades on the reported sales increasedfrom $623 million in 2005 to $693 millionn in 2006, according to filings with the . The documentzs list Ohio as a "developingt market," with six franchis locations throughoutthe