Chipotle to close all restaurants on Feb. 8 for food safety meeting

In a drastic step announced Friday, Chipotle will shut down all its stores nationwide for a few hours next month to hold staff meetings about food safety.

The meeting will occur on Monday, Feb. 8.

Chris Arnold, a representative for the Denver-based Mexican restaurant chain, released the following statement to KRDO NewsChannel 13:

“We are hosting a national team meeting on Monday, Feb. 8, to thank our employees for their hard work through this difficult time, discuss some of the food safety changes we are implementing and answer questions from employees. All U.S. restaurants will be closed for lunch and will re-open at 3 p.m. in each time zone.”

The announcement capped what is Chipotle’s best week on Wall Street since the food crisis began in mid-August. Friday’s closing stock price of $475.57 is an 85 percent increase since Monday.

Mark Rantal, a Chipotle customer, said the closing strategy is smart.

“This is a public opinion problem, far more than it’s a health problem,” he said. “I think the idea of shutting down publicly to take a look at this just backs up what their brand has been the whole time.”

Last year, Rantal ate at Chipotle every day for five months. He said he has since reduced his visits to three days a week, but not because of the food crisis.

Laura Clark said she last ate at Chipotle a week ago, and hadn’t heard about the situation until informed of it by KRDO NewsChannel 13.

“Just knowing that there’s so much going on with the company, I think I’m going to be a little scared to go eat at Chipotle,” she said. “You just don’t mess with food. I don’t even know if I’ll want to eat there again.”

Customers have mixed opinions about whether business is down at Chipotle eateries, but according to one employee, sales have declined enough that many employees are working fewer hours.

Chipotle has suffered from several outbreaks of E. coli, salmonella and norovirus that poisoned customers and caused its stock price to plunge more than a third over the last three months.

The trouble began in August when 64 customers in Minnesota were infected with salmonella and about 100 people were struck by norovirus in southern California.

These infections were followed by an E. coli outbreak in October and November that affected 53 people in nine states.

In December, Chipotle suffered from two more outbreaks. Roughly 140 students at Boston College were infected with norovirus and a second incidence of E. coli broke out, affecting five people in three states.

Some customers are suing Chipotle.

The company has projected an percent drop in sales for the fourth quarter. Chipotle will provide its quarterly financial results on Feb. 2.

But CEO Steve Ells said earlier this week that he was “hopeful” the Centers for Disease Control would soon declare that the outbreaks are over.

“We know that Chipotle is as safe as it’s ever been before,” said Ells Wednesday at a conference in Orlando.

He said that Chipotle is planning to lure back customers with a new marketing campaign in February.

Chipotle spokesman Chris Arnold said there hasn’t been an E. coli case in two months. Since then, the company says it’s been serving a million customers a day “without incident.”

The Denver-based company has more than 1,900 restaurants, including 17 outside the U.S.