Inside White Castle's New Columbus Headquarters

A Conversation with John Kelley

We sat down with John Kelley, Chief People Officer and fourth-generation family member, at White Castle’s headquarters near West Goodale. The conversation moved easily between past and present. How the site has changed. What happens inside the building today. How work done there finds its way into restaurants across Columbus and beyond.

Rather than focusing on milestones or announcements, the discussion stayed grounded in place. In how a long-established organization continues to build, test, and adapt alongside a city that has grown around it for nearly a century.

“We fulfilled Billy’s potential vision from the 1930s when he first saw this site. The site is flourishing.”

Staying Put

White Castle started in Wichita, Kansas. By 1933, the company had expanded into most of what it now considers its core markets. When Billy Ingram decided to relocate headquarters, Columbus made sense. It was centrally located relative to the company’s operating areas across the Midwest and East Coast.

The original building at 555 West Goodale was a converted tire plant. John’s grandfather’s first job was scraping rubber soot off the windows. The company stayed there for about 80 years, gradually acquiring surrounding land and selling off manufacturing operations that had once produced everything from porcelain restaurant exteriors to dryer vent lids for Maytag.

The New Headquarters

The new building opened at the end of 2019, three months before COVID. The 20-acre campus includes the headquarters, a second office building, apartments, and an event center called The Fives. There is space for a third building along Goodale that remains intentionally undeveloped while the company considers what should go there.

The headquarters earned LEED Gold certification. Sustainability ranked highly in internal surveys as a value among team members, which influenced decisions about materials, dishware, and building systems. The company has long avoided Styrofoam and ships buns in reusable cardboard that gets eight to ten uses before being retired.

“We’ve got fifth generation working here. We actually had our first sixth generation born a couple months ago. Our goal is to be a family-owned company for generations to come.”

Inside the Building

The building includes subtle references to the brand. The central tower, viewed from above, traces the shape of the White Castle logo. A stainless steel slide connects the second and third floors, inspired by the spiral freezers in the company’s frozen hamburger plants where packaged sliders descend on similar slides after freezing.

The lobby, called Craver Hall, was designed with visitors in mind. People regularly stop by the headquarters unannounced, often sharing stories about grandparents who took them to White Castle decades ago. The old lobby was small and dated. The new one reflects how the company’s culture has evolved over 80 years.

Testing and Training

The headquarters includes a test kitchen with movable equipment that can be reconfigured to prototype new restaurant layouts. Before building the Castle of Tomorrow restaurant on Alum Creek Road, the team mocked up the equipment arrangement in this space to test whether it made operational sense.

The kitchen also supports training. When rolling out a new product across 350 restaurants, the training team can film instructional materials in an environment that closely matches what employees will see, without disrupting an active restaurant.

What Is LEED Certification?

LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) is a green building certification program developed by the U.S. Green Building Council. Buildings earn points across categories like energy use, water efficiency, materials selection, and indoor environmental quality. Certification levels range from Certified to Silver, Gold, and Platinum.

For White Castle’s headquarters, achieving Gold certification involved decisions about low-VOC paints, locally sourced materials, reusable dishware, and building systems designed for efficiency. The upfront cost is often higher, but the investment reflects values that matter to the people who work there.

“You generally expect loyalty from people to whom you’re loyal.”

A New Restaurant Prototype

The Castle of Tomorrow opened in October 2024 on Alum Creek Road. It was designed to address how customer behavior has changed, particularly the growth of delivery and mobile ordering. About 70 to 80 percent of sales go through the drive-through. A significant portion now comes from third-party delivery.

The new design includes a vestibule where delivery drivers can pick up orders without waiting in the drive-through line. The footprint is smaller than previous restaurants, with a reconfigured interior that prioritizes operational efficiency. Team member areas were expanded to provide a proper break space with charging stations and training resources.

Technology and Service

The restaurant features Julia, an AI-powered drive-through ordering system named after Julia Joyce, an early employee who gave tours and spoke to women’s groups about the company. The system handles order-taking while team members focus on fulfillment and direct customer interaction.

Rather than handing orders through a window, team members step outside to deliver food directly to cars. This adds a human touch that balances the automation and allows for flexibility when orders take longer or when multiple cars can be served simultaneously.

“Our site has been cocooned for 80 years. Like a butterfly, it has now flourished and bloomed.”

Part of the City

The apartments on campus are open to anyone and typically have a waiting list. The event center hosts weddings and other gatherings most weeks, with views of the downtown Columbus skyline. The development reflects a live-work-play approach that was planned before COVID reshaped assumptions about office space.

A butterfly screen along one of the campus roads serves as public art. An artist, after hearing the story of the site’s transformation, proposed the imagery: the property had been cocooned for 80 years and has now emerged.

Looking Ahead

White Castle continues to expand, with new restaurants planned for Florida, Texas, and Arizona. The company also evaluates where to build within existing markets as neighborhoods shift and grow. Frozen products remain competitive in the grocery aisle, with recent additions like chicken rings that air fry well.

Through it all, the company remains family-owned. The goal is to stay that way for generations to come, standing on the shoulders of those who came before while setting things up for what comes next.

Visit the Campus

Tours of the White Castle headquarters can be arranged by emailing wcauction@whitecastle.com. The tour includes access to the fifth-floor terrace with views of the Columbus skyline and various interior details that pay homage to the company’s history.

Learn more at whitecastle.com and follow White Castle on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, and X.

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