When my friend Sarah first moved to Florence, Alabama from Austin, Texas to enjoy life at a slower pace, she was excited to see a fast-food restaurant sign that reminded her of home. Jack in the Box was a go-to when study sessions extended past her favorite taco stand’s opening hours. As she explored North Alabama, she saw more and more “Jack’s,” the jaunty possessive surely some sort of fresh branding for the 75-year-old California chain.
But why so many West Coast quick-service joints in this small Southern town? When unpacking gave way to exhaustion, it was time for her taco fix. She drove to the nearest Jack’s, less than a mile from her new home, only to find the dining room dark and parking lot empty. Familiar with the corporate promise of 24-hour service, she figured she’d try the drive-thru. She squinted at the foods pictured on the menu board. Not only could she not find the loaded tiny tacos she craved, but the other options were foreign to her. Barely visible biscuits smothered with ashen-white gravy, levitating alongside 6-piece fried chicken baskets and was that a bologna sandwich? She drove away dazed and went to bed hungry and confused.
After a good night’s rest, Sarah Googled “Jack’s restaurant” and the mystery dissolved. It’s important to be specific when embarking on this internet search. Unless your device knows you well, you’re likely to be directed to Jack in the Box, the company that only recently started franchising throughout the Southeast. Prior to December 2025, when it opened a location in Hinesville, Georgia, Jack in the Box wasn’t found south of Tennessee and the Carolinas.
Like Sarah, you might confuse the two brands. Aside from the name, the chains both have red-backdropped logos with tilted lettering that could come from the same Adobe family.
But I could never mix up the two. Just as one may have their favorite local coffee shop, I have my best-loved Jack’s. And while chain restaurants are supposed to be generic, my Jack’s feels very personal.
The poorly engineered drive-thru; the chaos at the window interrupted by a coo of ‘How many sauces you want today, baby girl?’; the unavoidable sting of hot fries on my too-eager tongue: these are my comforts.
Jack in the Box was founded in San Diego in 1951, where its headquarters remain. The burgers-and-beyond chain, innovative in its popularization of the drive-thru two-way intercom system, franchised rapidly across the West over the next few decades until it was halted by an infamous E.coli outbreak in 1993, leading to reforms in food safety standards nationwide. From there, Jack in the Box spent years rebounding and rebranding with quirky, risqué campaigns that raised eyebrows and sparked a lawsuit or two.
While Jack in the Box has around 2,200 restaurants, Jack’s Family Restaurant has just over 250. What began in 1960 as a walk-up hamburger spot in Homewood, Alabama became a regional chain, opening outlets in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, and Tennessee while maintaining a mom-and-pop energy.
Early logos for Jack in the Box featured crude illustrations of the windup toy before the company in the 1970s transitioned to variations of boxed-in bubbled fonts. Then, in 2009, that logo was jettisoned for a handwritten-style “Jack” across an angled red cube.
Starting in 1975, Jack’s logo was an all-caps “JACK’S” in cursive-style script, slanted across a red circle. Two years after Jack in the Box debuted its new logo, Jack’s switched to a lookalike mixed-case font, still slanted and encircled in red.
Social media posts suggest the similarity has confused consumers. Still, I personally do not believe there was a nefarious plot to trick fast-fooders across the South into thinking they were dining at Jack in the Box. I see the logo shift as a natural transformation, a subtle update. But maybe as a life-long Jack’s devotee, my vision is a little blurry.
Before my grandfather passed away this past October, just short of his 91st birthday, he ate at his Jack’s every single day with very rare exception. When my grandmother was in and out of Helen Keller Hospital many years ago, we’d refuel at that same Jack’s. With seven locations within a seven-mile radius of my Florence, Alabama home, Jack’s was a cornerstone of my childhood Sunday lunches and remains a staple of my adult mornings-after.
Sometimes the only cure for an evening of too much wine or whiskey is a sackful of Jack’s steamy, meat-sopped biscuits and—if it’s late enough that lunch items are ready—a Big Jack bacon burger, with a glorious mound of fresh crinkle-cut fries doused in orange-tinted popcorn salt (we call this golden hour of dual meal periods the “Jack’s Hack”). My friends and I recently shared a haul of greasy, brown paper bags and pebble-iced sodas in Styrofoam cups. We overlooked the spread of Jack’s with sappy expressions. Sarah was at this gathering, so I asked her more about Jack in the Box. She spoke dreamily of the since-closed location on “The Drag” near the University of Texas campus, with deep-fried tacos so oily they became translucent.
When asked if she had been converted from Jack in the Box, she then told us about her favorite Jack’s, a beacon on a stretch of road between Florence and Memphis emerging out of miles of Mississippi emptiness. Her Jack’s calmed the stress of a work trip that lay ahead. I’m counting this as a “yes.” Maybe the two brands didn’t get it wrong in hoisting similar logos after all. Mika, another Alabama transplant, peeled back the film of a signature sauce ramekin and proclaimed “A Southerner just knows where their Jack’s is. They may not be able to tell you what the logo looks like or the roads they take to get there, but they always know.”
While working on this essay, I’ve been visiting a Jack’s off Highway 72 regularly for breakfast, deeming it appropriate to trade in my yogurt smoothies and matcha lattes for salty hash brown pucks and infinite refills of bitter coffee.
Aside from the food, the Jack’s on 72 is anything but fast. One Friday, a large group of gentlemen file in as if they travelled there by sprinter. They gather round a circular table like gray-haired knights in squeaky sneakers, Alabama baseball caps, and arrays of denim. Their butter-soaked wax paper mounds of sausage sandwiches sit before them, the meeting soon to be called to order.
Others arrive, flowing into a nearby table, and somebody says, “They’ll be more comin’.” Before long, the men have rearranged furniture so there’s room for everyone, trading the round table for several rectangle ones forming a runway down the center of the room.
An employee jokingly scolds them as she refills their coffee and grins with warm familiarity. They are 13 strong and their stories fly from one end of the table to the other, a tall baritone in the center repeating details to those on either side who may be unable to hear the punchline of the joke.
So, this must be their Jack’s, I think. I drain my cup and invoke my grandfather, who would have felt right at home.
Kristy Bevis is consulting wine director at Odette in Florence, Alabama, assistant label manager for indie record label Single Lock Records, and the owner of All The Best: Records & Refreshments. She has devoted more than a decade to making her Shoals hometown a more appealing and inclusive place to live, work, visit, and play.
Fun, interesting article!
Great article! The food descriptions are clear and relatable, especially for Southern Jack in the Box fans. The writing is engaging and does a great job highlighting the menu favorites.