Portillo's in Gurnee to Open Tuesday

The northnernmost Portillo’s will be opening soon.

The restaurant announced it will be opening a location in Gurnee on Nov. 10. The restaurant’s opening can be credited, in part, to the efforts of Joe Kahn, a Gurnee resident who started the Facebook page, “Gurnee Wants a Portillo’s.”

The Facebook page hit a 1,000 likes on its first day live, Kahn said in an interview posted on the Portillo’s website. To date it has over 4,700 followers.

“Portillo’s opening in Gurnee has been a hot topic as long as I’ve lived here. Every time a new parcel of land would open up or a new building was started, there were rumors that it was going to be a Portillo’s. But it never was,” Kahn said. “I got the idea to start the Facebook page as a way to not only be a central source of information, but as a way to get support for what I truly believed was a solid location for a new store.”

The Facebook page helped Kahn organize efforts, which included hundreds of e-mails to Portillo’s, asking for the restaurant.

The Portillo’s will be opening in Gurnee Mills Circle at 6102 W. Grand Avenue in Gurnee. The restaurant will be located northeast of Bass Pro Shops at Gurnee Mills. A grand opening and ribbon cutting ceremony will be held at 10:30 a.m. on Nov. 10.

And the Gurnee Wants Portillo’s Facebook page has not stopped now that they’ve ensured a Portillos’ will be opening. The Facebook page is now drumming up support to beat the record, held by a Rockford Portillo’s, of the largest number of first-day orders.

“Let’s beat Portillo’s first day attendance record. Rockford ain’t got nothin’ on us! 5,000 orders? We got that!” according to the Facebook post.