The Burger King. Jim McLamore

spend their money.” I used that expression often in our early training sessions and in our attempts to emphasize the importance of fast service.

      The Insta-Machines turned out to be a complete and utter disaster. I have previously described the temperamental nature of the machines, but one incident involving the Insta-broiler needs to be told. During our first year in business, Dave had just finished adjusting the temperamental Insta-broiler before opening. After running smoothly for an hour or so, the machine began to malfunction just at the moment Dave was standing in front of it. When he heard the gnarling and twisting sound of metal on metal as the machine ground to a halt, he went into a fit of rage. Acting more in frustration than anything else, he reached into his toolbox and grabbed a hatchet, which had been his as a Boy Scout. The name on the handle spelled out “Davy Edgerton.” He was so upset that he drew the hatchet back and sunk the blade into the stainless steel machine, destroying a good part of the working mechanism. Dave yelled, “I can build a better machine than this pile of junk,” which prompted my response, “Well you better get busy and build it because right now we are out of business until we get our only spare machine in operation.”

      Dave, true to his words, did build a better broiler. He took his idea to a Swedish-born mechanic named Karl Sundman, who had a well-equipped machine shop. Three weeks later the pair finished production of a continuous-chain broiler that was efficient, fast, productive, and trouble-free. To this day, that basic design principle still sets the standard for all Burger King broilers, and it served as a model for the manufacture of restaurant equipment used in operations similar to our own.

      Cramer and Burns sold other franchises during the mid-1950s, opening stores in Hollywood, Ft. Lauderdale, West Palm Beach, Melbourne, Ft. Pierce, Tampa, Orlando, and, of course, in their own Jacksonville area. These new franchisees experienced the same sales problems and financial difficulty that we were having. All of us were trying to hold on until we could figure out some way to “jump start” the business and put it on the road to higher sales and profitability. With stagnant sales and losses piling up, we began to think that all of us might have made a mistake to get into the Insta-Burger King business.