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July 2, 2013 Tuesday
With an expected influx of perhaps thousands of workers, area restaurants are gearing up for what's to come with the Cline Shale oil boom by expanding their catering capabilities to include oil field services.
The idea of food catering to drilling and hydraulic fracturing or fracking sites is rapidly picking up steam in Abilene, a city many energy experts say will play a big part in the oil play. Oil field catering has become a very lucrative business in the Permian Basin to the west and Eagle Ford Shale to the south.
Motorists passing going south from Abilene on U.S. Highway 277 may have noticed a big sign in front of Texas Steak Express advertising its newest service: oil field catering.
The kind of service isn't new to the restaurant chain. Its stores in Midland and Odessa are experiencing growth due to catering at job sites. Those locations have been servicing the oil fields in the Permian for four years at a frequency of at least three times a week.
"We've been doing (other) catering since we opened (in Abilene) but since (the Cline Shale) is here now, we're trying to let them know we can service them," Robert Cano, Steak Express' director of operations, said Tuesday. "Especially where (oil rigs) are located: It's not easily accessible to food, that's why they call us out there to feed them so they can stay on the job and keep going."
Twelve-hour oil field shifts mean there isn't much time spent away from the job so many oil companies are using restaurants to cater meals as often as budgets allow, according to a recent a report. For instance, Oklahoma City-based Chesapeake Energy, a major stakeholder in the Cline, often uses catering services to feed crews working on its rigs in South Texas.
Abilene's Steak Express is not new to site catering. It often get called out to service workers at wind farms in Taylor and Nolan counties. Cano said the restaurant consistently served food during the height of turbine construction some years ago.
Joe Allen's Pit Bar-B-Que have done some oil field catering in the Midland-Odessa area, and its owner, Josh Allen, said he hopes to do a similar service in the Cline Shale area.
"I've had a couple of calls (in Abilene) from some perspective clients about doing some (catering within the Cline) and I'm just kind of waiting to hear back from them and be ready to rock and roll," Allen said. "I've done some oil field catering in the Midland-Odessa area and one of them was a gas plant they had just built outside of Big Spring."
Exploration and production companies often have food catered during the hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, stage of a well process because that is when the most people are on site at the same time. Depending on the size and depth of the well, the process can require between 25 and 90 people on site at any given time.
Lytle Land and Cattle Co. is ready to tackle the added business, its assistant manager, Gabe Stokes, said.
"We have not done (oil field catering) simply because we have not been contacted by any company, but if they contact us, we will definitely get into that," Stokes said.
"Anywhere we can get to and anywhere anybody needs us to go," Elaine Vinson, catering coordinator for Sharon's Barbeque and Catering, said. "If we can get access to where they need it we can get the food there."
Copyright 2013 The E.W. Scripps Company. All Rights Reserved.
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