SINGAPORE: It’s a well-known fact that Singaporeans love a good queue. Their patience to wait in line has become legendary, except maybe when wanting to get into JB, but that’s another story.
However, when noted US fast-food chain In-N-Out Burger opened a one-day pop-up store at Columbus Coffee Company in Upper Thomson on Friday (May 31), and some eager beavers got a head start and showed up to queue at 3:30am, nearly six and a half hours before the store was scheduled to open, some wondered if a new record for voluntary queueing had been set.
By 8:55am, when the store did open an hour early, the queue already had 300 people, The Straits Times reported.
ST added that the 500 burgers the store had on hand were all gone even before the pop-up was officially set to open its doors (it was supposed to have been operating from 10 am to 4 pm).
The two people who lined up at 3:30am actually decided to just stay up all night instead of having to wake up very early.
“Is this a record for burgers?” asked the Singapore Matters Facebook page, which shared a screenshot of the ST piece. “Wow, Singaporeans will queue this early for burgers!” it added.
To this, a commenter jokingly replied that he was disappointed that Singaporeans were becoming slackers, as he had expected they’d start lining up at 6pm the night before.
“Seriously these people need to get A LIFE!,” another wrote, while “Singaporeans will ‘Q’ for anything,” a netizen chimed in.
Another wondered if the people who joined the queue go to work.
Are the burgers that good though? The fast-food chain gets an average 3.9 out of 5 stars on Yelp from a whopping 113,100 reviews. So the answer is, maybe? This is the chain’s fourth time in Singapore, and chances are they’ll be back, so more people will be able to see for themselves.
By the way, people who were disappointed at missing out on In-N-Out burgers may have better luck as Chick-fil-A, also a well-known American fast-food brand, is set to open a pop-up for three days from June 26 to 28 at Esplanade Mall.
Not only will diners be able to sample what some say is the US’ best-tasting fried chicken but they’ll also be donating to a good cause when they do so.
Each meal will be selling for S$10, with 100 per cent of proceeds going to Community Chest, the philanthropy and engagement arm of the National Council of Social Service (NCSS). /TISG
Read also: Hundreds of foreigners queue overnight in Singapore for iPhone 15 release