30 Facts about In-N-Out Burger (including the secret menu!)

If you've lived in California, then you've probably tasted an In-N-Out Burger. In fact, the high-quality fast food burger joint is a Cali institution, with rabid fans instead of just customers.

Here are 30 facts about our favorite, In-N-Out Burger (including the secret menu!):

1.    There are presently 313 locations of In-N-Out Burger in existence, most of which sit in California, the food chain’s home state. But there are also locations in Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Texas and Oregon.

2.    There are four In-N-Out Burger locations in Sacramento and 18 in total among Sacramento, Placer, Yuba, and El Dorado counties.

3.    In-N-Out Burger was founded in 1948 when newlyweds Harry and Esther Snyder opened the first location.

4.    Harry Snyder was a huge fan of drag racing and once bought 50% of the Irwindale Raceway just so that he could serve In-N-Out at their concession stand.

5.    The Snyders always had their sons, Guy and Rich, do entry-level work prepping, doing dishes, and taking out the trash when they worked at the family chain. 

6.    After founder Harry Snyder passed away in the 1980s, his son, Rich Snyder, a devout born-again Christian, started printing Bible verses on the bottom of In-N-Out cups and wrappers, although the company has never released a formal statement on the matter.

7.    That humility and work ethic was passed down to Lynsi Torres, heiress to the In-N-Out franchise fortune when she turns 35, which will instantly launch her into the $500 million-plus income bracket.

8.    Back in 1948, the first In-N-Out location featured a groundbreaking (at the time) drive up lane for cars, the precursor to our modern drive-up window.

9.    In fact, In-N-Out was the first chain to install two-way speaker systems in their car drive up lanes, as before that, “carhops” came out to take orders and deliver food.

10. The intercom and drive-up lanes revolutionized the burger business, allowing customers to "get in and out" quickly, hence the name.

11. However, it wasn't the first, as Red's Giant Hamburg in Missouri had implanted a drive up window the year before. But when Red's closed in 1984, In-N-Out became the oldest drive-through burger joint in the country.

12. The chain didn’t expand outside of California until the 1990s, when it put their first non-California location in Las Vegas, Nevada.

13. Most In-N-Out locations have a pair of crossing palm trees planted out front. That signature landscaping was an inspiration from the movie "It's a Mad, Mad World," in which treasure is buried beneath palm trees in the shape of a W. Owner Harry Snyder wanted to mark each of his restaurants as its own treasure, so he opted for two crossed palms in front.

14. Known for it’s creative and sometimes secretive menu options, the first “animal style” hamburger was introduced in 1961.

15. But after that, few changes were made to the menu even as the decades rolled on. In fact, the only two changes since 1996 include sweet tea in a few Texas locations recently, and the addition of Dr. Pepper in 1996.

16. Since their inception, In-N-Out’s philosophy has been to “serve only the highest quality product, prepare it in a clean and sparkling environment, and serve it in a warm and friendly manner.”

17. In fact, In-N-Out's food is never frozen or pre-packaged, making it a far cry from typical fast food and endearing the pallets of loyal patrons.

18. They make every hamburger patty at their own facilities and ship them fresh to stores daily. According to In-N-Out Burger policy, no food product can ever travel more than 500 miles from a production facility to a restaurant location.

19. For that reason, there are no In-N-Out Burger chains in the East Coast, much to the chagrin of hungry would-be customers. But that didn’t stop a magazine from pranking New Yorkers in 2010 on April Fool's Day when it announced that the hamburger chain was opening in Manhattan.

20. In-N-Out makes a significant investment in hiring, training, and keeping the best employees in the business. In fact, there’s an In-N-Out University where new managers are trained diligently.

21. With each manager making at least $100,000 a year and even starting employees earn a competitive living wage, it’s no wonder why In-N-Out has the lowest turnover rate of any burger or fast food chain, with managers serving an average tenure of 14 years.

22. Other than buying a tasty lunch, you can buy In-N-Out swag like hats, t-shirts, pajamas, tracksuits, and even custom Uggs on their website, in-n-out.com

23. Enough with the chit-chat, let's get down to the facts about the secret In-N-Out menu! Not listed on the regular menu and the stuff of Cali lore, you can order options like a side of pre-packaged yellow chilies, root beer floats, bun doughnuts, pepperoncinis on your burger, and a "Monkey Style" burger that has animal style fries on top of a burger patty.

24. Although the company denies it’s a secret, there are a host of expanded menu options that many people don’t realize. For instance, burgers come cooked medium-well as the standard, but you can order your burger cooked the way you like it, including medium rare – a testament to the quality of their meat.

25. On the alleged “top secret” menu, there are also seven different ways you can order French fries: fries light, fries well done, fries light well, fries no salt, fries with special sauce, fries with cheese and fries with grilled onions.

26. For vegetarians, the grilled cheese or veggie burger are big hits, and one of the most popular off-menu treats is the Neopolitan Shake, blending strawberry, vanilla, and chocolate ice cream into one shake.

27. Not long ago, there was one remarkable option on the secret menu where you could order any combination of meat plus cheese, detailed in a numeric format like 4x4, (four patties and four slices of cheese).

28. That all changed when some rowdy customers in Las Vegas ordered a 100x100 option (100 burger patties and 100 slices of cheese!). Needless to say, they were politely refused, and In-N-Out instituted a max 4 x 4 policy after that.

29. In-N-Out offers a variety of creative wallpaper images as well as custom ringtones available for free download at http://www.in-n-out.com/downloads.aspx

30. Hollywood celeb Paris Hilton once was arrested for drunk driving on her way to In-N-Out Burger for a late night after-party snack. She tried to justify her DUI to Ryan Seacrest by explaining, “I was just really hungry and I wanted to have an In-N-Out burger!"

30 Big, Orange, Foggy Facts About the Golden Gate Bridge!

If you’ve commuted to San Francisco recently for work, driven into the city for dinner and a show on a weekend, or even live in the City by the Bay full time, you’ve probably seen the Golden Gate Bridge hundreds of times, but still it always stands out as a beacon on the skyline. In fact, the Golden Gate Bridge was the preeminent icon of architecture for its time, the defining monument of a city like none other save New York’s Empire State Building, and is just as remarkable today as it was when it opened in 1937. With the bridge’s 70^th birthday just passing in May and its historic 80^th milestone coming up next spring, we thought we’d shed some light on The Bridge that’s inspired poems, songs, basketball team logos (go Warriors!) and stood as a symbol for San Francisco’s progressive spirit.

Here are 15 colossal facts about the Golden Gate Bridge to get started, with 15 more in part two of this blog to get you all the way to the other side!

1. The Golden Gate Bridge is 8,981 feet (1.7 miles) long and 90 feet wide.

2. It weighs 887,000 tons and contains about 88,000 tons of steel, alone.

3. It contains six driving lanes and two sidewalks, and street level is 220 feet above the water below.

4. Two towers connect the two massive steel cables that anchor the Golden Gate Bridge. The cables each contain about 80,000 miles of wire inside.

5. The towers stand 4,200 apart from each other, 726 feet above the water and 500 feet above street level. Each tower contains about 600,000 rivets, which are now replaced with galvanized high-strength bolts when they corrode.

6. Where did the name for the bridge come from? The ocean strait that was the entrance to San Francisco Bay was first named Chrysopylae by U.S. Army Captain John Fremont in 1846, which is Greek for “golden gate.”

7. Even the signature burnt orange color of the Golden Gate Bridge is famous. Called "GGB International Orange," the custom paint is made with the formula: is Cyan: 0 percent, Magenta: 69 percent, Yellow: 100 percent, Black: 6 percent and currently supplied by Sherwin Williams.

8. But making it that color wasn’t ever the plan. In fact, the steel that first arrived to build the bridge happened to be coated in a burnt red and orange primer. When the bridge was near completion and they had to decide what color to paint it, architect Irving Morrow favored the orange primer better than the other paint choices such as carbon black and steel gray. They also found that the orange hue was visible in the fog, so they decided to paint it the same color.

Those won’t the only color options as the U.S. Navy – which, as we’ll find out, was a huge proponent of the bridge’s construction, wanted the Golden Gate to be painted in black and yellow stripes so it would be always visible to passing ships. The Army Corps took the bad design one step further, rallying for loud red and white stripes (like a candy cane!) so it would be visible from the air to passing planes.

9. The idea for the bridge first was proposed in 1872, when railroad executive Charles Crocker introduced a plan to the Marin County Board of Supervisors for a bridge that would cross the Golden Gate Strait.

10. The plan was deemed impossibly far-fetched at the time, since the strait was more than a mile wide at its narrowest point, and the frigid water had rough currents of 4.5 to 7.5 knots.

11. The project was shelved until nearly 50 years later in 1919, when a San Francisco city engineer named Michael O’Shaughnessy conducted a study to determine the realistic potential and cost of the bridge. O’Shaughnessy reported that it could be done, but it would probably cost around $100 million. To put that unheard of sum of $100 million in perspective, that’s worth about ten times as much in today’s dollars.

12. Construction commenced on January 5, 1933 with plenty of pomp and circumstance in front of 100,000 spectators, including a 21 gun salute, a parade at nearby Crissy Field where a message sent by President Herbert Hoover was read, and engineering students revealed their 80-foot long model of the proposed bridge, complete with carrier pigeons who took off to spread the message of the bridge’s commencement all over California. To conclude the ceremony, San Francisco Mayor Angelo Rossi and bridge Board President William P. Filmer broke ground using a golden spade.

13. The Golden Gate Bridge took a little over four years to complete (much more on that massive undertaking later) at a much lower cost than projected of only $35 million.

14. The official opening for the Golden Gate Bridge was on May 27, 1937, kicking off a week of celebrations until June 2. The opening day was called “Pedestrian Day” when people could walk the bridge only, and 15,000 people every hour cross the turnstiles, each paying 25 cents for the privilege to be on the historic bridge. Always creative, the residents of San Francisco and well-wishers crossed the bridge on foot but also on roller skates, stilts, and even unicycles! Vendors sold an estimated 50,000 hot dogs that day.

15. The next day at noon, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt sent a telegraph from the White House announcing the Golden Gate’s opening to the world. At 3 p.m. that day, a Navy fleet of 42 ships sailed under the bridge, and at 10 p.m. that night the day’s festivities concluded with a grand fireworks display shot off the new bridge.

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Look for part two of this blog, when we cover 15 more facts about the iconic Golden Gate Bridge, including earthquakes, the identity of the billionth driver to cross, and it’s haunting record of suicides.