Raising Cane's Chicken Fingers (commonly known as Cane’s) is a fast-food restaurant chain specializing in chicken fingers, that was founded in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, by Todd Graves and Craig Silvey on August 26, 1996. While company headquarters remain in Louisiana, a second restaurant support office was opened in Plano, Texas in 2009.
Todd Graves first started dreaming of his very own restaurant in the early 1990s. Craig Silvey, an initial partner in Todd's plan, was enrolled in a business plan writing course at LSU at the time. They wrote the business plan and Silvey turned it in, for which Silvey received a "B-". Although the business plan was rejected numerous times by potential investors, Graves set out to earn the money he needed to start the restaurant, first by working in refineries in California, then by fishing for sockeye salmon in Alaska. He and Silvey then obtained an SBA loan, which they used to open the first restaurant in Baton Rouge at the intersection of Highland Road and State Street near the LSU campus. They even drew on the help of friends and family for some of the work on Cane's 1, and many of these names are carved in the restaurant woodwork. Originally, the small restaurant competed against a similarly themed drive-in called Bailey's Chicken Fingers on the opposite end of the campus. By 1999, however, it was able to prove itself the more successful business: it forced Bailey's out of business, becoming the only chicken-finger focused restaurant in the area.
Raising Cane's offers a limited menu consisting of four main combos: "The Box Combo," "The 3-Finger Combo," "The Caniac Combo" and "The Sandwich Combo." It also includes a Kid's Meal and several sizes of bulk chicken items called Tailgates.
Cane's Sauce is provided with all chicken finger meals and is the signature sauce of the restaurant; customers may opt for Louisiana hot sauce and/or honey mustard sauce for free. Only managers at Cane's have access to the recipe. They are held to a confidentiality agreement regarding any details about the recipe, which features a mix of spices that come packaged to each restaurant.
