OX-B’s Chicken opens first Columbus location, partners with BrewDog

Sheron Colbert
Wed, 09 Nov 2022 00:48:50 +0000
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OX-B’s Chicken restaurant front signage which features Gary, the multi-colored rooster logo. Credit: Sheron Colbert | Lantern reporter

Ohio State students feeling peckish and looking for a new fried chicken restaurant can find their way over to OX-B’s Chicken.

OX-B’s Chicken, an Ohio-based chicken brand, partnered with BrewDog’s Short North location and opened Oct. 27 at 1177 N. High St.

With several locations throughout Licking County, Andrew Shayko, owner and vice president of operations of OX-B’s, said this is its first Columbus location and a good match for BrewDog.

“It was almost a perfect marriage at first sight, and we all loved it,” Shayko said. “They had the space open up next door and said, ‘Hey, we want you here. We’re sick of having mom-and-pop shops in here. Let’s get a real restaurant, real brand in here to really help take BrewDog to the next level.’”

According to its website, OX-B’s offers a variety of options — including wings, traditional appetizers, salads, wraps, tofu and signature dishes, such as a “slopwich” and “chiliwich.”

Shayko, a 2010 Ohio State graduate with a food and business management degree, said he understands students’ struggle of getting around campus, so OX-B’s will offer promotions through third party ordering apps — such as DoorDash — to make food more accessible.

For students who are at least 21 years old, Shayko said he urges them to come out to BrewDog, have a drink, hang out and try food from OX-B’s.

Dan Eisenhauer, co-owner and partner of OX-B’s, said there are tables throughout the space for dining, and OX-B’s has its own app for ordering food.

Eisenhauer said the Columbus location will be OX-B’s sixth location and third physical store, though the first official OX-B’s restaurant was a shipping container.

“There was about a two-year time frame where they developed the concept and then fabricated the shipping containers,” Eisenhauer said. “It started back in 2018 with the first container opening up early in 2020, which of course was challenged because of COVID, but with the design of the shipping containers, it actually worked really well to minimize personal contact.”

As of right now, he said the shipping container locations are just self-contained kitchens, but they do have plans to provide indoor seating inspired by the concept. Shayko said using a shipping container was cost effective in OX-B’s effort to test out its restaurant idea at different sites, and the market responded.

“The results were overwhelming, which actually led us to build our second and third mobile food unit,” Shayko said.

Shayko said operating out of shipping containers is what gave the restaurant its name.

“We were going to operate all these shipping containers, right?” Shayko said. “Which we do three of them, and they’re boxes. So, if you go with B-O-X-S and if you move the B behind the O-X, it spells OX-B’s. We operate all our shipping containers, if you put the B in front of OXs it spells boxes.”

Shayko said their long-term goal is to partner with Ohio State and have its multicolored rooster logo, Gary, seen on campus.

“Having the Gary plastered at Ohio Stadium and the Schott would be amazing and really make a dream come true,” Shayko said. “But one day that’ll happen. But in the short term, we’re going to do everything we can to make sure that Ohio State knows we’re here — here to stay.”

This story has been updated as of Monday, Nov. 14 at 5:15 p.m., Licking county, OH was misidentified.?