Carl ’s Jr. andHardee’ssigns and menus look precisely alike — down to that cheerylittle starlogo . Are they the same restaurant have by someone who could n’t determine on a name , or are the similar identity the resolution of a turf warfare ?
The twoburger chainsstarted out as totally freestanding entity , one on the West Coast and one in the eastern U.S. Carl ’s Jr. is the elder of the two , establish asa Los Angeles hot dog standin 1941 by Carl Karcher . Business thrive , and five year later there were five full - sized Carl ’s campaign - In Barbecue restaurants , which by then had begun service hamburgers . Before long , burgers were the concatenation ’s bestselling computer menu item , so Karcher decided to open a separate group of lowly , speedy - service beefburger join , dubbing them Carl ’s Jr.
Wilbur Hardee opened his first restaurant inNorth Carolina in 1960 ; soon , Hardee ’s became a intimate flying food sight in the Midwest and South . Hardee ’s corporal strategy was to open up eatery in smaller towns that were not serve up byMcDonald’sorBurger King , and by all accounting , it paid off . By the early ‘ 90s , there were more than 2500 Hardee ’s locations , cause it the rural area ’s fourthly - large riotous food chain .
In 1997 , Carl Karcher ’s partnership , CKE Restaurants , acquire Hardee ’s for $ 327 million . The move was an opportunity for Carl ’s Jr. to quietly expand into the East without agitating Hardee ’s existing client . They preserve the name , and , at first , the menu that folk were familiar with ; the partnership started to introduce Carl ’s menu item to Hardee ’s locations in the early 2000s . They also refurbished the existing building and signage , eventually top to the strikingly similar visual aspect today .
A version of this story ran in 2015 ; it has been updated for 2023 .
