Dee's Drive-In - History

History

Dee Frederick Anderson, a fast-food entrepreneur from Ephraim, Utah, opened his first Dee's Restaurant in 1932. He was inspired to create Dee's Drive-Ins after seeing drive-in restaurants during a 1953 visit to Long Beach, California. Established a year later, his first Dee's Drive-In was a $125,000 building at 753 E. 2100 South Street in Salt Lake City. On average, the shop served 2,500 customers daily, selling burgers, hot dogs and apple turnovers for 19 cents and French fries and soft drinks for ten cents. Within two years, Anderson had opened his two more drive-ins and Dee's Drive-In had 100 employees. One of Anderson's friends opened a franchise in Johannesburg in 1972, which was the first American fast food outlet in South Africa. Dee's Drive-In went on to have 53 restaurants earning over $20 million annually.

In the late 1970s, the Anderson family chose to focus on other business ventures, particularly on their property management operations. All remaining Dee's Drive-Ins were sold to Hardee's; Hardee's withdrew from Utah just months before its purchase by CKE Restaurants, which subsequently expanded its Carl's Jr. brand there without any previous connection to Hardee's.

Twelve Dee's Family Restaurants remained in operation in the Wasatch Front area of Utah until March 2004, when five Salt Lake outlets were sold to real estate developers. The restaurants were transformed into Walgreens, in a deal which marked "the point of entry" into the Utah market for developer Phillips Edison. In August 2005, the restaurant chain settled an employment discrimination lawsuit filed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on behalf of three employees who alleged they had been sexually harassed by a co-worker at a Dee's location in Midvale. As part of the settlement, the company agreed to revamp its sexual harassment policy and employee training procedures.