This iconic California company is leaving the state

The sign outside an In-N-Out Burger restaurant Sunday, Dec. 8, 2024, in Lone Tree, Colo. | David Zalubowski

In-N-Out Burger may have gotten its start in California but its owner has decided it’s time for a move.

In an appearance on the “Relatable” podcast released Friday, Lynsi Snyder said she is shifting the burger chain’s headquarters to the suburbs outside Nashville, Tennessee.

“We’re building an office in Franklin,” she said. “I’m actually moving out there.”

This move isn’t sudden. In 2023, In-N-Out announced it planned to open a corporate office in Tennessee, along with expanding its restaurant chain to the state, within the next three years.

Snyder said she “loved” growing up in Northern California and that “there’s a lot of great things about” the state.

“But raising a family is not easy here. Doing business is not easy here,” the In-N-Out president added.

She and her husband, Sean Ellingson, co-founded Slave 2 Nothing, which advocates against human trafficking and substance addiction.

The couple, who share four children, also founded Army of Love, a Christian ministry with the goal to “unite and equip the body of Christ to minister and bring healing to broken hearted and hurting people.”

The company, known for the printed Bible verses on its packaging, has owners known for their religious roots.

Workers toil in an In-N-Out Burger restaurant Sunday, Dec. 8, 2024, in Lone Tree, Colo. | David Zalubowski

Snyder isn’t affiliated with a political party, but her burger business’ political donations show a more conservative bent.

Before 2016, In-N-Out didn’t hold a lengthy history of contributions. Most notably, it donated $120,000 to a state action committee against government-run health care in the early 2000s.

California Republicans received between $25,000 and $30,000 from the burger chain from 2016 to 2020. The company typically donated the same, if not similar, amount to the Californians for Jobs and a Strong Economy committee, which backs business-friendly Democratic candidates, or certain conservation efforts.

The restaurant’s support for the California GOP increased between 2021 and 2024, when it donated nearly half a million dollars. It’s worth noting that one of the first donations during these years coincided with the recall effort against California Gov. Gavin Newsom.

At the time, In-N-Out’s chief legal and business officer Arnie Wensinger stated that the restaurant makes equal contributions to committees on both sides of the aisle.

“We believe that bipartisan support is a fair and consistent approach that best serves the interests of our company and all of our customers,” Wensinger said.

Other donations show this family-owned restaurant was seeking a change in California’s politics.

Story Continues

From 2022 to 2024, In-N-Out committed $12.8 million to the Save Local Restaurants committee that opposed a law requiring fast-food companies to adhere to a $20 minimum wage.

In-N-Out, known for paying competitive wages, would need to raise its hourly rate to $23 or $24 to keep up with its service quality in California.

Despite the hefty monetary support, the burger chain lost the battle after labor unions struck a deal with state legislators in 2024. In-N-Out raised prices on menu items to keep up, Snyder said at the time.

The restaurant business struggled under California’s lax policies against crime and donated half a million dollars in support of the Homelessness, Drug Addiction and Theft Reduction Act, which passed in 2024 and incorporated additional criminal charges into the state’s penal code.

Last year, Snyder said In-N-Out was closing an 18-year-old location in Oakland because of crime, a first for the family-owned business.

“A lot” contributed to the decision, Snyder said in an interview, reported by SFGate.

“Gunshots went through the store, there was a stabbing,” she said.

At the height of the pandemic, the fast-food restaurant took a stance against requiring vaccination records and mandating masking at their establishments.

As a result, in October 2021, two San Francisco locations temporarily shut down for a few days for repeatedly violating the county’s public health order, according to The Los Angeles Times.

“There were so many pressures and hoops we were having to jump through. You know: ‘You’ve got to do this, they have to wear a mask, you have to put this plastic thing up between us and our customers,’” she said on the podcast.

Snyder said when she looks back at that time, she wishes the company had “pushed even harder … and dealt with all the legal backlash.”

For In-N-Out, it came down to a principle: “We’re not policing our customers.”

The headquarters may be moving away from California but the 281 restaurant locations aren’t going anywhere, Snyder confirmed.

“It will be wonderful having an office out there” in Tennessee, Snyder continued.

When In-N-Out was established in 1948, it was the first drive-thru hamburger joint in the state. Now, the burger restaurant has a total of 400 locations across eight states, including Nevada, Arizona, Texas, Oregon, Colorado, Idaho and Utah.

Throughout this time, their No. 1 priority has stayed the same: Hold on to the values that Snyder’s grandparents, Harry and Esther Snyder, founded the company on.

“We don’t want to be in every state, and we don’t want to ever compromise our values and standards and the cornerstones that my grandparents laid down,” Snyder said.

Will this $7.3 billion burger company expand to the East Coast?

“Florida has begged us and we’re still saying no,” she said.

In fact, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, in a private meeting with Snyder, pitched bringing the chain restaurant to his state but she declined and pointed out that all their suppliers are based on the West Coast.

But the future doesn’t look too bleak for a possibility with the latest move.

“The East Coast, we’re saying no. We are able to reach Tennessee from our Texas warehouse,” Snyder said. “Texas can reach some other states.”

This iconic California company is leaving the state

Tags: