The In-N-Out heiress whose grandparents founded the popular burger chain said that the company’s decision to close its sole Oakland location was due to the site being “absolutely dangerous.”
“I mean, there was a lot,” Lynsi Snyder told Marissa Streit of the right-leaning video network PragerU on Monday.
“There was actually — gunshots went through the store, there was a stabbing, there was a lot.”
Snyder, 42, said that the company shuttered the profitable outpost “for the safety of our associates” because “we just felt like, this is not OK.”
Her comments were first reported by the news site SFGATE.
In-N-Out made the decision to pull out of Oakland after an 18-year presence in the city this past January. It served its final customer in March.
It was the first time in its 75-year history that the company permanently shuttered one of its restaurants.
“Despite taking repeated steps to create safer conditions, our Customers and Associates are regularly victimized by car break-ins, property damage, theft, and armed robberies,” Denny Warnick, the company’s chief operating officer, announced in January.
“Additionally, this location remains a busy and profitable one for the company, but our top priority must be the safety and wellbeing of our customers and associates – we cannot ask them to visit or work in an unsafe environment,” he said.
Workers at the shuttered In-N-Out location were given the option of either transferring to another one of the company’s fast-food restaurants or accepting a severance package.
Months after the closure, the building remains vacant. It is listed for $4 million.
Violent crime is considerably higher in Oakland than the national average, according to FBI statistics.
The In-N-Out that was closed was in a busy business corridor that attracts travelers headed to the airport and baseball fans who attend A’s games at the Coliseum. However, the A’s played their final season in Oakland this year and are eventually moving to Las Vegas.
Since 2019, police have logged at least 1,335 incidents in the vicinity of the restaurant on Oakport Street — more than any other location in Oakland.
That number includes nine robberies, two commercial burglaries, four domestic violence incidents and 1,174 car break-ins, according to Oakland police data shared with the San Francisco Chronicle.
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