| Industry | Fast food |
|---|---|
| Founded | Inglewood, California, United States (1946)[1] |
| Founder(s) | George Foster |
| Headquarters | Rancho Cucamonga, California, United States |
| Number of locations | 91 (2010) [2] |
| Area served | California |
| Key people | Randy Fritchie (CEO) [3] |
| Products | Soft serve, hamburgers, chicken |
| Parent | Fosters Freeze LLC |
| Website | fostersfreeze.com |
Fosters Freeze (full name Foster's Old Fashion Freeze) is a chain of fast-food restaurants in California. It was founded by George Foster in 1946 on La Brea Avenue in Inglewood, California, a location that still remains, and claims to have been the first fast-food chain in the state. George Foster later sold the Foster's Freeze franchise to William Bouldier and his affiliate who owned and managed the restaurant chain for several years. After a decade of success, Bouldier sold his stake in the business to his partner due to a conflict in the business' international expansion.
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The Fosters Freeze name comes from the fact that it is best known for its soft-serve milkshakes and ice cream, which is reflected in the marketing slogan, "California's Original Soft Serve." Its mascot is an ice cream cone wearing a chef's hat.
At franchise locations the company also offers a variety of foods, including hamburgers, chicken strips, and fish but it has not followed trend of other fast food restaurants and lacks a healthy eats menu, due to mainly selling burgers and fried foods. The ice cream though is healthier as it is low fat soft serve. A small serving of soft serve in a cup is approximately 130 calories.
The restaurant's original slogan was "Everything at Foster's is wonderful to eat" and the slogan has taken on a retro appeal in recent years. The lyrics of Foster's Freeze jingle used in are, "Remember soft-serve ice cream? Nothin' tastes the same. If you want original soft-serve, Foster's is the name. Burgers cooked to order, the way they used to be; Everything at Foster's is wonderful to eat. Food that's made to order, so your order's always fresh, So slow down just a little and have a little treat; Everything at Foster's is wonderful to eat!"
In 1955, the first Fosters Freeze franchise was started in Tulare, California. It was first owned by Clarence and Margarite Fries. Months later it was sold to Lee and Maxine White. When the Whites took over ownership, they bought three trucks from which they would sell ice cream all over Tulare and surrounding towns such Exeter and Lindsay. Since ice cream is a taxable product and food is not, they had two separate windows. Customers could purchase their ice cream at one window and their hot dogs, burgers and fries at another window.[4]
In 1972, Clyde and Barbara Blackburn purchased Fosters Freeze in Tulare and in 1996 moved the location to 1330 East Tulare Avenue, where it still remains. According to Linda Ruminer, Foster Freeze's new site is where business really picked up, and on January 1, 1997 Foster Freeze had to close its doors so that they would be able to restock their merchandise to better serve their customers. Foster Freeze's business was doing so well that they could afford to hold Cruise Nights to get their community together to have a good time.[4] Cruise Nights is a classical vehicle show that displays as many as three hundred classic vehicles. It started at Auburn, California’s Foster’s Freeze in 1984 when, showing off classic vehicles became popular. Cruise Night would come together at Foster’s Freeze and reminisce about the glory days.[5] Even famous people such as Flip Wilson, Steve Perry from the rock band Journey, and Robert Conrad have been spotted at the Tulare location grabbing a bite to eat.[4]
Maxine White now volunteers at the Tulare Historical Museum and enjoys telling stories of the days when her and her husband had had ownership of one of the Foster Freeze locations. The executive director of the Tulare Historical Museum, Terry Brazil, once stated that she could remember when she used to go with her husband's aunt down to the local Foster Freeze, because she had to have one of their "delicious hamburgers with the wonderful, tasty sauce." Lee White and Clyde Blackburn were business partners as well as close friends. Lee White died in 1994.[4]
The Fosters Freeze franchise in Hawthorne, California is known to be the Hamburger joint, where Beach Boy band member Dennis Wilson saw the girl in the Thunderbird he sang about in his song titled “Fun, Fun, Fun.”[6] Recently the USA softball team was seen eating at the Salinas location before heading off to Beijing to participate in the 2008 Olympics.[7] Also, the Atwater location was used in a scene of the movie, Pulp Fiction where Bruce Willis’ character runs over Ving Rhames.[8] The historical significance that Fosters Freeze has is what attracts patrons and unites community members to try to keep developers from taking away a piece of nostalgia from them. In 2006, the neighborhood of Menlo Park, located in northern California, presented to their city council a petition with about 800 signatures to avoid demolition of their local Foster’s.[9]
After 60 years in the business, Fosters Freeze has 92 locations in California as of 2010.[10] Some of the company's first locations in California included Sunnyvale, Mountain View, and Palo Alto. The Palo Alto location, across the street from Stanford University's Campus on El Camino, remains virtually unchanged since c. 1950. The oldest locations are often historic landmarks. In its humble beginnings it was bigger than McDonald’s, Del Taco, and other chains. The shelf life of the ice cream made expansion to other states challenging. The mixture only lasts 17 days and that made it difficult to transport it to other states. That is why the chain has been limited to California and is a contributing factor that has resulted in many store closures and the lacking of staying power in the field of fast food.
El Pollo Loco enacted a master franchise contract with Fosters Freeze in 1994.[11] Mark Hardinson, the grilled-chicken chains director of marketing, stated that sales boosted from three percent to six percent at El Pollo Loco's co-branded chains that served Fosters Freeze's soft-serve desserts.[11] There are ninety nine Fosters Freeze branches that do not include the one hundred and sixty-three El Pollo Loco's that serve Fosters Freeze products. Over half of El Pollo Loco's serve Fosters Freeze products.[11] The corporate office is currently located in a suburb of Los Angeles, in Rancho Cucamonga, California.