The Habit Burger Grill migrates from Utah to The Village at Meridian

The Habit Burger Grill found its way quickly to the Village at Meridian once the burger chain, founded along the beach, decided to venture beyond California.

The Habit, established in 1969 in Santa Barbara, now has 109 burger-seafood fast-casual eateries in California but only opened its first out-of-state store in 2010 in Arizona.

The Habit at The Village will be the chain’s 22nd non-California store when it opens Nov. 4. Idaho will be just the seventh state for The Habit, which just opened its first Las Vegas store in August and Florida stores in June. New Jersey got two Habits in 2014.

The same man who brought The Habit Burger Grill to Utah in January 2013 is looking north to Idaho. Tom Hartman, a market partner at The Habit, has since opened nine Habits in Utah, including one at the Station Park lifestyle shopping center in Farmington.

“Station Park is my best performing Utah store, substantially better than No. 2,” Hartman said.

Station Park and The Village at Meridian are both owned by CenterCal Properties, an El Segundo, Calif., retail development company that has properties in California, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Oregon and Washington.

“CenterCal had approached us to look at the Meridian site a couple years back and I went out to check on the site and market and we decided, at the time, we weren’t ready to enter the Boise (metro),” said Russell Friend, The Habit’s chief development officer. “We revisited the site about eight months back and CenterCal was delighted to find out we were ready to enter the market and told us that they had this space available.”

In the meantime, The Village, which opened in October 2013, developed some street cred with national retailers, said Ramona Merrill, regional marketing director at The Village.

“That’s a phenomenon happening with Meridian with sales of some stores putting Idaho on the map,” Merrill said. “We’re getting calls from retailers and restaurants that we weren’t on the map for.”

CenterCal and The Habit are in talks in Oregon and Washington, too.

“We’re working with them in other states in the Northwest,” said Merrill. “They are very popular in Utah. Habit Burger is going to be great addition to The Village.”

Idaho is familiar territory for Hartman, who was previously the area supervisor for Marie Callender’s Restaurant & Bakery stores in Idaho, Washington, Colorado and Utah from 1997-2002. If the Meridian Habit Burger performs well, Hartman may open a second Habit Burger in Treasure Valley within a year and possibly live here.

Hartman is especially drawn to the “family atmosphere” at both Station Park and The Village at Meridian.

“I like how they maintain their property,” Hartman said about The Village. “They are very retail-oriented in how they run the center. It’s sharp.”

Hartman describes The Habit setting as upscale fast-casual in a fast-food environment, where, Hartman said, the target ticket time is a maximum seven minutes. Surfer prints dot the walls and higher quality furnishings fill the room.

The Habit starts with fresh beef that has not been frozen and sushi-grade albacore tuna sliced from a loin, he said.

“It’s a literal tuna sandwich,” he said. “There’s no substitute for quality. The original founders were absolute fanatics about the quality of the food.”