Beach shack eateries now in Ontario

ONTARIO RESTAURANT NEWS

05-01-2007

A restaurant chain that offers an alternative to traditional Mexican food, in the relaxed atmosphere found in shoreline food shacks in Baja and southern California, has plans to make a splash in Ontario in the next year. Taco Del Mar is now evaluating about 30 sites in Ontario and needs franchisees to open stores, Darryl Chandra told ORN last month. Chandra, who with two partners has the master franchise in Canada for the Seattle, WA-based chain, said that his company's plans call for 20 to 30 units to be up and operating by next spring. Last month construction had begun on four Ontario locations expected to open by June, in Vaughan, Thatched palapas help contribute to the southern California mood.

The new units will range in size from 850 square feet with 20 seats, to 2,200 sqaure feet with 50 seats. A typical operation would be about 1,200 square feet with 35 seats. The Canadian operation's executives have moved to an office in Ontario, leaving functions such as marketing to be handled out of their Vancouver office. In British Columbia, Taco Del Mar has opened 29 locations since it came to the province about four years ago. This year it expanded to Alberta, with one restaurant open in Calgary, and eight more planned in that city. In Edmonton the company has 10 franchises sold, and three already open. The company plans to have 20 stores open this year in the province, and 30 by 2008.