Taco Bell to open 350 locations without a drive-thru so it can finally sell more booze
Perhaps more than any other fast food dining option, Taco Bell really depends on the drive-thru. It’s not that Taco Bell tastes better if you let it sit in a bag for a few minutes while you drive home, though, it’s that eating Taco Bell in the first place is an inherently shameful experience. Sometimes you just have to eat at McDonald’s for whatever reason, or you need to make a Wendy’s stop to get one of those spicy chicken sandwiches, but if you eat at Taco Bell it’s because you want to, and nobody should have to be seen while they do something so savage. That means Taco Bell would have to have a really good reason to remove the shame-protecting drive-thru from any of its locations, and according to a report from E! News, it has found one: booze.
Earlier this year, Taco Bell announced a new line up “upscale” restaurants under the name Taco Bell Cantina, with the chief difference—alongside more stylish seating and probably a high-tech version of that game where you put a coin in the thing and try to catch it on a little platform—being that the Cantinas would be able to serve alcohol. At the time, only a handful of Taco Bell Cantinas were open in the U.S., but the project was apparently enough of a success that the company has announced that it will be opening an additional 350 Cantina locations over the next five years. The only catch is that these Cantinas won’t have a drive-thru, because apparently there’s some federal law that frowns on people driving around with open containers of booze and tacos.
Thankfully, alcohol happens to be the one thing that negates the shame of eating Taco Bell, so if you’re inside a Taco Bell Cantina and munching on a Cheesy Beefy Chalupa thing while sipping from a Mountain Dew Margarita or whatever, nobody’s going to think you’re a gross Taco Bell person. Instead, they’ll think you’re a rad Taco Bell person who totally knows how to party. E! doesn’t say when these new Cantinas will open, but hopefully it’ll be as soon as possible.