Loyal customers, dedicated employees, an involved managerial team and, of course, the cake-like battered fried chicken—these are the secret ingredients of the Chicken Shack’s success.
As Business Report details in a feature from the current issue, other establishments might want to take note. After all, the Chicken Shack has been around for 80 years, making it the oldest known continuously operating restaurant in Baton Rouge.
“We sell over 800,000 pounds of chicken a year,” says owner Joe Delpit, son of the late Thomas Delpit, who established the first Chicken Shack in the front of his family’s shotgun home on East Boulevard in 1935.
All these years later, with three Baton Rouge locations, an express truck and plans to expand, Delpit says he’s not surprised his family’s restaurant made it to where it is today.
“Actually, it was my dad who first wanted to expand,” he says. “He mentioned it to me, but he died before we could do anything.”
Today Delpit, 75, has fulfilled his father’s wishes and more, as he and his childhood friend and part owner, Henry Baptiste, are making plans to open a New Orleans location and to seek further expansion through franchising.
The Delpit family has operated as many as six Chicken Shack locations, but three still stand today in Baton Rouge: the Acadian location at 413 N. Acadian Thruway, the Mohican location at 3939 Pawtucket St. and the Scotlandville location at 8372 Scotland Ave. near Southern University.
The Acadian restaurant, opened in 1978, is the oldest still in operation, while the newest Chicken Shack in Scotlandville is only a year old. The original on East Boulevard now serves as an administrative office.
“I love the Chicken Shack business,” says Delpit, who started working there at just 5 years old. “It’s my passion.”
When it all began 80 years ago, the Chicken Shack was actually a small sweet shop.
Thomas Delpit originally named it the Suburban Ice Cream Parlor, but two years later in 1937, he dubbed his shop the Chicken Shack and added menu items like red beans and rice, homemade pies, cakes and seafood.
It was his “knuckle-suckin’-good” fried chicken, though, that kept customers coming back for more.
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