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Burgerville (originally Burgerville USA) is a privately held American
restaurant chain A chain store or retail chain is a retail outlet in which several locations share a brand, central management and standardized business practices. They have come to dominate the retail and dining markets and many service categories, in many pa ...
in
Oregon Oregon () is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of its eastern boundary with Idaho. T ...
and southwest
Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...
, owned by The Holland Inc. As the chain's name suggests, Burgerville's sandwich
menu In a restaurant, the menu is a list of food and beverages offered to customers and the prices. A menu may be à la carte – which presents a list of options from which customers choose – or table d'hôte, in which case a pre-established seque ...
consists mostly of
hamburger A hamburger, or simply burger, is a food consisting of fillings—usually a patty of ground meat, typically beef—placed inside a sliced bun or bread roll. Hamburgers are often served with cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, pickles, bacon, ...
s. As of May 2005, all Burgerville locations were within a 180-mile (290-km) radius, mostly in the
Portland metropolitan area The Portland metropolitan area is a metro area in the U.S. states of Oregon and Washington centered on the principal city of Portland, Oregon. The U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) identifies it as the Portland–Vancouver–Hillsboro, ...
. The chain had annual revenue of around $75 million in 2010, at which time it had 39 locations and about 1,500 employees. In addition to burgers and fries, Burgerville offers other products such as
chicken The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domesticated junglefowl species, with attributes of wild species such as the grey and the Ceylon junglefowl that are originally from Southeastern Asia. Rooster or cock is a term for an adu ...
and
turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...
sandwich A sandwich is a food typically consisting of vegetables, sliced cheese or meat, placed on or between slices of bread, or more generally any dish wherein bread serves as a container or wrapper for another food type. The sandwich began as a po ...
es,
veggie burger A veggie burger is a hamburger patty that does not contain meat. It may be made from ingredients like beans, especially soybeans and tofu, nuts, grains, seeds or fungi such as mushrooms or mycoprotein. The patties that are the essence of a ve ...
s, fish sandwiches, and fish and chips. The chain uses local ingredients, such as Tillamook Cheddar, and locally grown strawberries in its milkshakes and sundaes. Throughout the year it offers seasonal items such as milkshakes made with hazelnuts, pumpkin, fresh raspberries, fresh strawberries, and
blackberries The blackberry is an edible fruit produced by many species in the genus ''Rubus'' in the family (biology), family Rosaceae, hybrids among these species within the subgenus ''Rubus'', and hybrids between the subgenera ''Rubus'' and ''Idaeobatus' ...
, and side orders such as
Walla Walla Walla Walla can refer to: * Walla Walla people, a Native American tribe after which the county and city of Walla Walla, Washington, are named * Place of many rocks in the Australian Aboriginal Wiradjuri language, the origin of the name of the town ...
onion ring An onion ring, also called a French fried onion ring, is a form of appetizer or side dish in British and American cuisine. They generally consist of a cross-sectional "ring" of onion dipped in batter or bread crumbs and then deep fried; a v ...
s, sweet potato fries,
tempura is a typical Japanese dish usually consisting of seafood, meat and vegetables that have been battered and deep fried. The dish was introduced by the Portuguese in Nagasaki through fritter-cooking techniques in the 16th century. The word ...
-style fried
asparagus Asparagus, or garden asparagus, folk name sparrow grass, scientific name ''Asparagus officinalis'', is a perennial flowering plant species in the genus '' Asparagus''. Its young shoots are used as a spring vegetable. It was once classified in ...
and Yukon Gold potatoes.


History

Burgerville was founded in 1961 by George Propstra in
Vancouver, Washington Vancouver is a city on the north bank of the Columbia River in the U.S. state of Washington, located in Clark County. Incorporated in 1857, Vancouver has a population of 190,915 as of the 2020 census, making it the fourth-largest city in Was ...
. The first Burgerville was located on Mill Plain Blvd in Vancouver, about three miles east of downtown on the southeast corner of Mill Plain and Morrison. The chain uses 100%
wind power Wind power or wind energy is mostly the use of wind turbines to generate electricity. Wind power is a popular, sustainable, renewable energy source that has a much smaller impact on the environment than burning fossil fuels. Historically ...
for all of its restaurants and headquarters, and is the largest chain in America to do so. Burgerville uses only
trans fat Trans fat, also called trans-unsaturated fatty acids, or trans fatty acids, is a type of unsaturated fat that naturally occurs in small amounts in meat and milk fat. It became widely produced as an unintentional byproduct in the industrial pr ...
-free
canola Close-up of canola blooms Canola flower Rapeseed oil is one of the oldest known vegetable oils. There are both edible and industrial forms produced from rapeseed, the seed of several cultivars of the plant family Brassicaceae. Historically, ...
oil and sends 7,500 gallons per month to be transformed into
biodiesel Biodiesel is a form of diesel fuel derived from plants or animals and consisting of long-chain fatty acid esters. It is typically made by chemically reacting lipids such as animal fat ( tallow), soybean oil, or some other vegetable oil ...
. In 2004, Burgerville switched to range-fed beef raised without hormones and antibiotics. In 2007, it began composting
food waste Food loss and waste is food that is not eaten. The causes of food waste or loss are numerous and occur throughout the food system, during production, processing, distribution, retail and food service sales, and consumption. Overall, about o ...
which is expected to result in an 85% reduction in waste and $100,000 annual savings. In September 2009, after complaints from bicycle commuters, Burgerville began allowing bicyclists to order using its drive-through windows . The
fast casual restaurant A fast casual restaurant, found primarily in the United States and Canada, does not offer full table service, but advertises higher quality food than fast food restaurants, with fewer frozen or processed ingredients. It is an intermediate conce ...
chain was named by ''
Gourmet Gourmet (, ) is a cultural idea associated with the culinary arts of fine food and drink, or haute cuisine, which is characterized by refined, even elaborate preparations and presentations of aesthetically balanced meals of several contrasting, of ...
'' magazine as having the freshest fast food in the country in 2003, with offerings such as a salad with smoked salmon and Oregon hazelnuts. As of August 2007, their slogan is, "Choose Fresh, Local, Sustainable. Choose Burgerville." Also in 2007, Burgerville was awarded with the "Better Burger" award at the 1st Annual Food Network Awards. In January 2008, Jeff Harvey accepted the position of President and CEO of Burgerville after Tom Mears, the former holder of the titles stepped aside, and became Chairman of the company. In October 2018, Burgerville disclosed that it had suffered a data breach by the Fin7 hacking group of all customer credit and debit card information processed from September 2017 to September 2018.


Burgerville Workers Union

In April 2016, Burgerville workers organized and formed a labor union, the Burgerville Workers Union, with support from Portland
IWW The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), members of which are commonly termed "Wobblies", is an international labor union that was founded in Chicago in 1905. The origin of the nickname "Wobblies" is uncertain. IWW ideology combines general ...
, among other groups. The company opposed the union organizing effort and sought to discourage workers from joining. In 2018, the workers of one Burgerville restaurant in southeast Portland voted 18-4 in an NLRB-administered election to form a labor union; the vote compels the company to officially recognize the Burgerville Workers Union (BVWU) and to collectively bargain with it. The BVWU is the only fast food union in the United States with federal recognition. The union has demanded a $5 an hour increase in wages for all workers, fair scheduling, improved health care, and parental leave. In October, 2019, the workers union was preparing to
strike Strike may refer to: People * Strike (surname) Physical confrontation or removal *Strike (attack), attack with an inanimate object or a part of the human body intended to cause harm *Airstrike, military strike by air forces on either a suspected ...
following a breakdown of negotiations with the company over the previous 18 months. The company had offered an increase of $1 per hour for all employees to $13.50, six months ahead of when Portland's local minimum was set to increase to $13.25. As of October 2019, five Burgerville locations have held successful union drives.


Locations

As of October 2016, Burgerville had 47 locations throughout Oregon and Washington. On major highways leaving Burgerville's reach, there is usually a billboard resembling an overhead highway warning sign alerting drivers that there will not be another Burgerville location for approximately another 24,700 miles (39,750 km), which is the distance to the next Burgerville should one continue around the globe in that direction. The distance reported on each sign varies depending on the actual location of the billboard.


See also

*
List of hamburger restaurants This is a list of notable hamburger restaurants. A hamburger is a sandwich consisting of one or more cooked patties of ground meat (usually beef) usually placed inside a sliced hamburger bun. Hamburgers are often served with lettuce, bacon, tom ...


References


External links

*
Burgerville Workers Union

August 2004 story on Burgerville
from ''
The Splendid Table ''The Splendid Table'' is a weekly radio program about food hosted by Francis Lam. The program began in 1997 on Minnesota Public Radio, and was originally hosted by Lynne Rossetto Kasper until her retirement in 2017. It is produced and distribu ...
'' {{authority control Restaurants established in 1961 Fast-food chains of the United States Fast-food hamburger restaurants Hamburger restaurants Fast-food franchises Companies based in Vancouver, Washington Regional restaurant chains in the United States Culture of the Pacific Northwest Cuisine of the Western United States Localism (politics) Restaurants in Oregon Restaurants in Washington (state) 1961 establishments in Washington (state)