Amid long lines and customer anticipation, Mill Avenue’s Chick-fil-A hosted a 3-hour chicken extravaganza Tuesday night for customers willing to fill their stomachs in an all-you-can-eat nugget night.
Customers could purchase bottomless nuggets, waffle fries and soda for $12, so long as they stayed inside the store with a wrist band. Kim Robilotto, Chick-fil-A’s marketing director, said the store managers hope to get more involved in the community.
“We really just want to be a place where college students can go and feel comfortable to come hang out,” she said. “We love being just down the street from the University, and we really just want to build relationships with the students and to be generous to them.”
Every Tuesday, the Mill Avenue Chick-fil-A hosts a college night, which Robilotto said eventually sparked the idea of the all-you-can-eat nugget night.
“What we’ve transitioned to is, every fourth Tuesday of the month, we host something a little different,” she said. “In January, we did the all-you-can-eat breakfast and this month, we’re doing this.”
The store decided to offer nuggets to the public because of their popularity and ease, Robilotto said.
“Nuggets are a menu item that are really easy for the kitchen,” she said. “Our cooks are able to produce them at a fast quantity, so we can cook a whole bunch of boxes really quick and then get them out.”
Although the event’s Facebook page received a lot of popularity, totaling over 1,400 guests, Robilotto said the store was not hesitant to pursue the night.
“Social media can be a little deceiving,” she said. “Even though it says 1,400 or 1,500 people are coming, if we can serve between 300 to 500 people, that would be amazing.”
Computer science and philosophy sophomore Nicholas Tran said he thinks the night could be overwhelming for Chick-fil-A’s employees.
“My first reaction? It sucks to work for Chick-fil-A,” he said. “They must be working overtime with lots and lot of customers, and a couple of those are probably a–holes.”
Despite his anticipation for the store’s workers, Tran said he entered the store with a personal goal.
“I want to try to eat 60 nuggets tonight and I’m about (three) boxes away from that,” he said. “Sixty is a nice round number and it’s going pretty good. I think I can do it.”
Many customers waited in a line outside of Chick-fil-A before the event began, including business freshman Santana Sterling, who said he came early to beat the rush.
“I got here 30 minutes before it started, so I wasn’t worried about them running out of food for me,” he said.
Sterling said he thought the $12 cover free was appropriate, considering that he was able to eat roughly six boxes worth of chicken in one sitting.
“It was a good deal,” he said. “If they did it again, I would come back.”
Reach the reporter at aplante@asu.edu or follow @aimeenplante on Twitter.
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