A Fayetteville Hardee's closed. But were there signs of a new restaurant?

Myron B. Pitts, Fayetteville Observer
Updated ·4 min read

People do not see most fast food chains as historic but when you think about it, many of them keep chugging along for quite a long time. They can become part of our life stories.

And so it was for the Hardee’s at 5508 Raeford Road at the busy corner of Raeford and Skibo roads. The restaurant closed in December of 2022 after 40 years in operation.

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During 2023, there has been some activity at the property that has left folks wondering. For instance: A row of digital menu boards, like what you might see at a drive-thru, appeared, with no signage explaining what they were about. A guard in a security vehicle was stationed in the parking lot.

A former Hardee’s sits empty on the corner of Skibo and Raeford roads. The restaurant closed on Dec. 31, 2022.
A former Hardee’s sits empty on the corner of Skibo and Raeford roads. The restaurant closed on Dec. 31, 2022.

I drive by there frequently and it looked like maybe a restaurant was coming, one with multiple drive-thru screens. My daughter, Helen Ann, who is 8, speculated Sonic but the setup was not quite right. She likes Sonic so her guess, while educated based on the multiple menu boards, may have been as much hope as anything.

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There were no other signs of activity that would suggest a grand opening of a new place was in the offing.

Someone on social media either guessed or had heard that the location was some kind of testing site for drive-thrus.

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Then, just like that, the menu boards, the guard and the car were gone.

Welp, it turns out that social media guess was closest to the truth. (Yes that does happen.)

New tech for menu boards

“That was a temporary tenant doing some testing on some new-drive-thru technology,” said Mike Hancock, executive vice president for Boddie-Noelle Enterprises, which is based in Rocky Mount and owns 330 Hardee’s franchises in several states, including the one it closed on Raeford Road.

Hancock made clear the Boddie-Noelle lease had expired so he was not for sure of activity at the property. It is owned by a company named Bryanna, which Cumberland County property records say has a post office box in Texas and is appraised at more than $4 million.

“We moved out of that location,” Hancock said.

A sign on a former Hardee’s on the corner of Skibo and Raeford roads states the restaurant closed on Dec. 31, 2022.
A sign on a former Hardee’s on the corner of Skibo and Raeford roads states the restaurant closed on Dec. 31, 2022.

However, he gave more information: “I believe it’s under contract to be sold” in 2024.

Then, it’s anyone's guess what the next act will be for the ex-Hardee’s.

Fisticuffs in the 1980s

I have more interest in this particular Hardee’s than most.

Back in the 1980s, the restaurant was considered the “Seventy-First Hardee’s” — the place where Falcon fans would crowd into after football games. This was long before McDonald’s and Pizza Hut set up shop directly across from the high school, located further west down Raeford Road from the old Hardee's location.

A former Hardee’s sits empty on the corner of Skibo and Raeford roads. The restaurant closed on Dec. 31, 2022.
A former Hardee’s sits empty on the corner of Skibo and Raeford roads. The restaurant closed on Dec. 31, 2022.

I went to Westover but knew a lot of Seventy-First people from church, so me and my friends felt like we could bounce up in their Hardee’s after the game. I wound up in the biggest fight of my life there.

I told my family the story earlier this year after the restaurant closed, and we were driving by one day. What was the fight about? Who knows?

I was completely innocent in the affair. But you knew that. It’s me, after all.

Helen Ann and my son, Samuel, who is 10, enjoy when I tell the fight story or allude to it. I suspect it’s because they get to imagine their bespectacled father — whom they know to be very bookish and generally anti-violence — involved with some real, live fisticuffs.

I told them the truth that the scrap did not 100% go our way. But that’s because there were about 13 scurrilous Falcons vs. five honorable Wolverines.

Ha, I am just messing with Seventy-First.

As I said, Falcons were my church folks. And I have always seen the schools — at the time the most westernmost high schools in the county — as much sister schools as much as rivals.

That said: The Westover McDonald’s at 5009 Santa Fe Drive still stands.

So I guess we win.

Myron B. Pitts can be reached at mpitts@fayobserver.com.

This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: A Fayetteville Hardee’s closes. What happened next had people wondering.