New restaurant gives back to the community, offers organically grown foods
Thirty more people have jobs in Vancouver, Mountain View High school received a $2,300 donation through a grand opening fundraiser and local churches will get free burrito lunches starting next month.
It was all part of the opening week for Chipotle Mexican Grill, the latest national chain to put down roots in the city.
According to Chipotle Local Marketing Consultant Nilah Mazza, sheer demand brought the Latin-flavored restaurant to Vancouver.
"We’ve been a sponsor of the (Portland) Waterfront Blues Festival for the past two years and we had so many people ask when we were coming to Vancouver," Mazza said.
With the Nov. 13 addition of the164th Avenue location, Chipotle now runs seven eateries in the Vancouver/Portland Metro area and 500 nationwide. Store manager Chris Politowski said the restaurant donated 100 percent of its sales revenue from its opening night to Mountain View High School. The school used the money to buy a new lighted marquee. Also, said Politowski, the restaurant will begin feeding local church congregations.
"This is our way of saying ‘thank you’ to the community," said Politowski.
As consumers turn to healthy foods more and more and the Food and Drug Administration takes further steps to limit and even ban trans fats and other risky ingredients, the food service industry has taken notice.
Since its beginnings as a small burrito stand started by former line cook and now-CEO Steve Ells in Denver in 1993, Chipotle has advertised natural, preservative and additive-free ingredients. Mazza said it’s not easy for a chain as large as Chipotle to offer all natural, all the time. While the chain offers 100 percent naturally raised pork, only 50 percent of Chipotle’s chicken is naturally raised, and 30 percent of its beef. The restaurant also serves 25 percent organically grown beans.
Choosing to serve such foods is not cheap, but customers don’t seem to mind the higher prices. When the restaurant raised the price of its burritos by $1 after going all organic with that menu item in 2001, sales remained steady.
The organic approach has been called nothing more than a marketing ploy; indeed one of Chipotle’s original investors was McDonald’s.
"There’s so much talk about businesses using the whole foods concept as a marketing tool," Mazza said, "but the more people and businesses go along that path, the more incentives there are for farmers. It’s really neat to be a part of something that’s driving the change."
