PHOTOS: Where’s Burger Chef When We Need It?

How many of you went to Burger Chef?
How many of you miss it?
How many of you preferred Burger Chef over McDonald's?

Burger Chef debuted in 1957 in Indianapolis, quickly expanding throughout the country; the restaurant's heyday was in the 1960's through the early 1970's.

Unfortunately, the 15-cent hamburgers at Burger Chef became no match for McDonald's. Why?
Money and promotional gimmicks.

McDonald's had a gold mine with Ronald McDonald and all his McDonaldland buddies, but all Burger Chef had was Burger Chef & Jeff. McDonald's had a bigger budget when it came to new characters, new foods, new locations, more & more commercials on TV and radio, etc.

Burger Chef was the first to package a meal for kids and called it the "Funmeal" in the early 1970's...then McDonald's, seeing the Funmeal's popularity, came up with the "Happy meal" in 1979. Burger Chef attempted to sue McDonald's but lost the case (Burger Chef's "Big Shef" and "Shefburger" were also big hits).

So whatever happened to Burger Chef?

In 1982, the company was sold to Hardee's, who turned many Burger Chefs across the country into Hardee's Restaurants and the final Burger Chef restaurant closed it's doors in 1996.

Check out the PHOTO GALLERY ABOVE to see stills taken from some old vintage Burger Chef TV commercials.

So...how many of you loved Burger Chef?