By Emily Stonehouse

It’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for.

The long-discussed A&W Restaurant has opened its doors at 10 Hops Drive in Haliburton. With rumours circulating around town leading up to the opening, the manager of the facility, Sohail Khoja, was thrilled to officially welcome guests in on Saturday, Jan. 18.

“We wanted to do sort of a soft launch over the weekend,” he laughed. “Just to make sure everything was working and we were ready to go. But it didn’t end up being so soft.”

Khoja shared that hundreds of locals visited over the first weekend in business; many traveling from various locations across the county to check out the restaurant. “The love and support we have been receiving so far is overwhelming,” he beamed.

A&W Canada was originally a branch of the A&W Restaurants, based out of the United States. The first Canadian joint was opened up in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in 1956, with hundreds of locations across the country following suit in the years to follow.

By 1972, the Canadian operations were sold to Unilever, officially severing their link to the original American brand. In 1995, senior management purchased the chain from Unilever, and it is still privately owned, basing operations out of Vancouver, British Columbia.

There are 1,054 A&W locations across Canada, with 1,044 owned and operated by franchisees, and the remainder are owned and operated by A&W Food Services.

The new Haliburton location falls into the former category.

A&W marketing takes a keen interest in retro-branding, specifically targeting the Baby Boomer generation with its colouring, fonts, interior decor, and available menu items.

Khoja shared that construction for the specific site really started moving ahead in August of this past year, after a series of landlord changes and some details that needed to be finalized. Once they were given the green light, though, the process was fairly smooth sailing leading up to the opening weekend. 

Within 24-hours of opening their doors, the Haliburton location of the fast food joint started to see the reviews rolling in. “Finally in Haliburton!” one reads. “Even with the opening day rush the service was fast and friendly, and the food was excellent,” reads another. “Some of the best customer service I’ve ever experienced at a fast food restaurant. Happy to have some more food options in Haliburton!”

The restaurant plans on starting their days at 5:30 a.m. to accommodate the early morning rush, and staying open most days until 10 p.m., with the exception of Fridays and Saturdays, where they will not close until 11 p.m.

“We just loved seeing everyone come in,” said Khoja, “the smiles and the love we got on our opening weekend was just so great.”