‘All these people ...’ Charlotteans are loving socially-distanced BBQ and fried chicken.
Drivers once again packed the parking lot at one of Charlotte’s most iconic eateries Saturday night, the Bar-B-Q King drive-in restaurant on Wilkinson Boulevard.
So many cars tried to snare one of the 40 ordering stations just before 5 p.m. that some had to gingerly pull to the edge of the busy road to wait their turn.
The 60-year-old restaurant was in such demand that none of the staff could answer the phone when longtime customers said they called to order before driving in. It just kept ringing and ringing, they told the Observer.
“Last Saturday, we couldn’t get in,” customer Debbie Glenn said. She and her husband Bobby Glenn are regulars who drive from Mallard Creek, roughly 15 miles away, near Concord.
The Glenns and scores of other longtime regulars were back again Saturday, even knowing they’d wait longer for their fish, chicken and barbecue plates and the restaurant’s signature onion rings.
Debbie Glenn stood patiently outside the restaurant at about 5 p.m. waiting for their two quarter fried-chicken plates, as servers in masks and gloves continually carried order after order to cars and to patrons standing outside.
And the Glenns always will come back, they said, along with the sudden surge of new visitors.
Drive-in restaurant surge
Business is up at least 30% since the stay-at-home order went in effect in March, Bar-B-Q King owner Gus Karapanos told the Observer by phone before Friday’s lunch rush.
Customers on Saturday also say they’ve noticed similarly packed lots at other drive-in restaurants in the Charlotte region, from the South 21 restaurant on Independence Boulevard to the What-A-Burger in Concord. It could be several more weeks, at least, until restaurant dining rooms are permitted to open at reduced capacity in North Carolina.
The surge has startled some longtime Bar-B-Q King devotees, including 30-year patron Laura Abee.
As she stood outside the restaurant Saturday, the 54-year-old Charlotte native asked, “Where is everyone coming from?”
“All these people, it’s never been crazy like this,“ she said later as she and he husband, Rick, sat in their pull-out chairs beside their pull-out table awaiting her Po’ Boy and his onion rings and two burgers. “This is crazy.”
‘I’m tired of cooking’
People are itching to get out of the house, Karapanos said. And most days, the weather has been temptingly nice, he said.
By the end of each work week, people also are exhausted, Karapanos said.
And, as Debbie Glenn said, “I’m tired of cooking.”
Mackenzie Beatty, a 42-year-old Charlotte native, visited the restaurant for the first time Saturday with neighbor and friend Liz Peery, a 56-year-old Charlotte native who’d been there many times before.
Beatty said she’d just never given it a try, even though her mom, who died in 2018, and her late grandfather patronized the restaurant as far back as the early 1960s.
“You haven’t lived until you’ve been here,” Peery said. told the Observer.
Socially-distanced BBQ
Customers also know they’re safe staying put in their cars to both order and eat at his restaurant, Karapanos said. That ensures social distancing, he said.
And Bar-B-Q King servers wear masks and gloves delivering meals.
Customer Rick Abee, 61, has ordered at the restaurant since he was 6 years old, having grown up not a mile away. For 25 years, he and his wife have driven over weekly from their home off Providence Road in south Charlotte.
He theorized that new visitors might be trying the restaurant because the restaurants they regularly visit are closed during the pandemic.
Crowd surge or no, he and his wife will keep coming back, they vowed.
“The food is delicious,” Abee said. “And this is part of my youth right here.”
This story was originally published May 10, 2020 at 12:04 PM.