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Business & Tech

Five Guys Burger Opens in Potomac

The popular burger chain opened quietly on New Year's Eve.

Five Guys, one of the DC area’s biggest business success stories and hottest burger chains, has arrived in Potomac, sneaking in quietly with a New Year’s Eve opening.

The chain, which has dozens of burger places throughout the DC metro region and more than 900 nationwide, is faring well in its first week of operations at 9812 Falls Road.

“It’s booming. Business has been great,” said John Majano, one of the store managers Sunday afternoon.

Molly Catalano, director of public relations and communications for Five Guys, earlier had confirmed the Dec. 31 opening in an e-mail to Patch late last week.

Majano said the crew began setting up for the Dec. 31 opening two days beforehand, but they did not throw a New Year’s Eve Party. “We just opened up for business,” he said.

By any measure, Five Guys, which began with a single burger place in Arlington in 1986, is one of the DC area’s outstanding business start-up success stories.

As recounted on the company website, Jerry and Janie Murrell offered some blunt advice to their five sons: “Start a business or go to college.”

They chose the business start-up route and the rest is history. Between 1986 and 2001 Five Guys opened at five locations in the DC area and worked to perfect the fine art of making high-quality burgers.

In 2002, Five Guys expanded regionally franchising their operations in Maryland and Virginia. A handful of people, including former Washington Redskins’ kicker Mark Mosely, were astute enough to know and good thing when they tasted it and they jumped aboard.

The Maryland, Virginia and DC franchises sold 300 options within 18 months. The next big move was to franchise nationally.

A factor in Five Guys’ success may be its commitment to quality. The chain uses only fresh ground beef. “There are no freezers in a Five Guys location. Just coolers,” the firm asserts on its website.’

The company also uses only peanut oil for cooking and its menu is trans-fat free.

Result: the chain now has over 900 locations in 46 states and six Canadian provinces.

Now, there's one in Potomac, too.

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