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When S. Truett Cathy started his Chick-fil-A Inc. restaurant chain 21 years ago, he had trouble convincing mall developers to lease him space. Developers then believed that eating and shopping did not mix.
Cathy demolished that theory. A year after his first Chick-fil-A opened in Atlanta's Greenbriar Mall in 1967, it had the highest sales per square foot in the shopping center. Landlords still discouraged the idea in the first few years, but Cathy continued to open new outlets in malls in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He discovered that malls presented special opportunities. For one thing, Chick-fil-A could take advantage of a captive market, often luring in passers-by with free samples of chicken breast sandwiches. Locating restaurants in malls also eliminated the need for real estate selection and...