In-N-Out Burger -- The Next Olive Garden?

While I appreciate the excitement over the news that Chick-Fil-A and Carl’s Jr. are coming to Idaho Falls, as someone who watched the buildup to Olive Garden I feel compelled to comment that these don’t really compare.

Truly, is there anything that could excite people here to the degree that Olive Garden did in the three to four years before it finally arrived? The announcement was front page news. Once it was over, I felt like I did when the Beatles broke up.

I believe that only one chain restaurant has what it takes to inspire a feeding frenzy of the same magnitude, and that’s In-N-Out Burger. I’ll bet some of you started salivating right now. I rest my case.

Does the Irvine, Calif.-based chain have any plans to put a restaurant here? Who knows? Given my experience with chain restaurants, they never say yes or no until they’re ready to make an announcement. In-N-Out doesn’t franchise. If they do move into Idaho, my guess is they would start in the Boise area, because that’s the way it always seems to work. But I could be wrong.

The company’s practices and recent history suggest that an In-N-Out here is at least possible if not inevitable. They don’t build restaurants more than a day’s drive from one of their distribution centers, and they have one in Draper, Utah. Indeed, after opening in St. George in 2008, eight In-N-Outs subsequently popped up in the Salt Lake Valley.

I know what you’re thinking: “This is just a tease.” You’re right, but we all need some excitement, don't we?

Mmmm ... a mouth-watering Double-Double and fries from In-N-Out Burger.

An interesting link for the media-obsessed

I don't know how many of you listen to Fresh Air, which airs every morning at 10 on KISU, but this was an interesting interview with David Carr, media reporter for the New York Times.

http://www.npr.org/2011/10/27/141658047/david-carr-the-news-diet-of-a-media-omnivore

I especially liked how he described the Internet as a "self-cleaning oven" where errors can be revised or clarified much more easily than in errors in print. That's his background as a newspaperman talking, and I know how he feels.

My wife, Karen Juell, one of the best copy editors I've known, coined the slogan, "Error free is up to me." What would the world be like if everyone posting on the Web held that as sacred? Errors are unavoidable (I could tell you about a few doozies of my own), but a casual attitude toward them is something no one with any self-respect should take lightly.

RaboAgriFinance opening office at Snake River Landing

RaboAgriFinance, which provides financial services for agricultural producers and agriculture-related businesses across the United States, has announced it will be opening a new, larger office in Idaho Falls at Snake River Landing sometime between now and the end off the year.

The office will be at 960 Pier View Drive, occupying around 2,600 square feet, with ample parking and accessibility to the public. While waiting for the new office, RaboAgriFinance, a division of Rabobank, is operating at 901 Pier View Drive, Suite 202B.

The company has had an Idaho office in Twin Falls. “We are excited to continue to offer and expand our innovative approach to financial and risk management to this region’s agricultural businesses,” said Nathan Thomsen, the Idaho Falls office's team leader.

Anyone with questions can call Thomsen at 208-733-0044 or look at the company's Web site, http://www.raboag.com/.

A critical milestone? You tell me ...

BizMojo Idaho's pageview count passed the 1,500 mark this morning, which is very good news in my estimation. We started Sept. 5, and even a week ago I was optimistic about hitting 1,000 by Halloween.

One thing mystifies me, however. Looking at the stats from the past 24 hours, I noticed a huge spike at 2 a.m. -- 99 page views. This isn't the first time I've seen a spike at an odd hour, either, so I'd love for someone to explain to me what's happening. Maybe these numbers are skewed or weird, but when it comes to the Internet everybody wants to hear about numbers.

Google Analytics (which I only signed up for last week) show that between Saturday and Tuesday 131 people visited BizMojo Idaho, viewing an average of 1.89 pages and staying for an average of 3:02 minutes. Good or no? You tell me.

Most of our visits are coming from Facebook, where BizMojo Idaho posts show up automatically, but we've managed to forge links with two sites, http://www.city-data.com/forum/idaho/1410667-new-blogs-idaho-falls-development-junkies.html and http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=111280&page=55, and we're getting traffic from them as well.

In a few weeks, BizMojo Idaho will appear in Idaho Falls magazine, complete with a logo and a handsome head shot that I've asked to be Photoshopped to make me look 20 years younger and 20 pounds lighter. I'm still a great believer in the power of print, but I must admit that although I intend to be entertaining and informative my real motive is to bring readers to the blog. There will be a QR tag, and I'm very eager to see how this works. Old fogey that I am, I didn't even know what a QR tag was until a month ago.

I really appreciate the reception this project has gotten so far and look forward to where things go from here.

5 Buck Pizza receives help from E Center

Being on the lookout at all times for new restaurants, chain or homegrown, I had to find out about 5 Buck Pizza when I noticed it at 1585 West Broadway, where The Shoe Box used to be.

I suppose it would be enough to report on a new pizzeria, because I know readers here can’t get enough restaurant news, but there’s much more to the story than that. In addition to Idaho Falls, the Utah-based 5 Buck has locations in Blackfoot, Rexburg and Rigby. For its entry into the region, it received consulting help from the Eastern Idaho Entrepreneurial Center in Rexburg, better known as the E Center.

The E Center, which takes students from BYU-Idaho and sets them up on projects with professional guidance, did a competitive analysis and marketing strategy for company owner Rick Hancock. “We wanted to see what our competition was doing and what we needed to do to improve our customer visits, what products somebody may want to try and how to get our name out there,” Hancock said, in an article in the E Center’s August newsletter.

The team, comprised of a lead intern and several senior-level business students, researched the local competition and compiled best practices for each of the companies, helping 5 Buck recognize its differentiation opportunities and potential market niches. The team identified market opportunities with social media and mobile applications, and performed a price analysis on different strategies.

Being in a hurry, I didn't have a chance to check it out, but I'm sure a diligent BizMojo Idaho reader will after reading this.

Here's a link to 5 Buck Pizza's Web page: http://5buckpizza.com/stores.html

And here's a link to the E Center: http://www.idahoecenter.org/idahoecenter/

Blast Off! for sale; owners plan vacation

On the eve of their 15th year in business, Robert and Deanna Goody are looking for someone to buy Blast Off!, their North Yellowstone fun emporium. It's not a sad story or one involving economic distress.

Said Dena, "When we opened Blast Off! we wanted a business we could operate as a family and as you know our kids pretty much grew up at Blast Off! We are now empty nesters and want to spend some time traveling and having some fun."

The Goodys' children have all moved to Boise, where they are busy with jobs and school. None are interested in moving back to the Idaho Falls area. As for Robert and Dena, they recently celebrated their 25th anniversary and are planning to go to Europe for a week next month ("Our first real vacation in 15 years!")

As a business, Blast Off! is doing very well, she said. "We would like to find a family who has the same passion as we do about having fun. If we sell Blast Off! we will move on to the next chapter. If we don't we will continue to offer AWESOME fun, to the people of this area."

Idaho Falls: Where the rich ride mass transit

I am always interested when Idaho Falls makes some magazine's national listings. Such articles are usually rating the area's quality of life (which, let's admit it, is pretty good for any number of reasons), but this one is way more unique, which is why I'm passing it along.

http://www.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2011/10/5-cities-where-rich-ride-transit/257/