A banner suggesting In-N-Out was going to open on Telegraph Avenue had locals in a spin on Monday morning. Photo: Ted Friedman
A banner suggesting In-N-Out was going to open at 2333 Telegraph Avenue had locals in a spin on Monday morning. Photo: Ted Friedman

A banner announcing that an In-N-Out Burger restaurant was coming to Berkeley’s Telegraph Avenue sent the online world into a spin Monday morning.

Dozens of Cal students tweeted how excited they were – and then expressed disappointment when it was revealed to be a hoax.

Cal Ticket Office tweeted a picture of a banner hung up across the front of a boarded-up storefront at 2333 Telegraph around 8:12 a.m. today with the hashtag #InandOutTelegraph. Within a couple of hours, it had 243 retweets and had been favorited 205 times.

In-N-Out

I’ve never been so happy,” tweeted one person.

Thinking this was too good to be true, Avinash Kunnath, a writer for the California Golden Blogs went to work. He called In-N-Out headquarters and learned that the banner was a hoax. (One person has suggested it was a senior prank.)

The popular burger chain currently has no plans to put a restaurant in Berkeley, according to California Golden Blogs. There are two In-N-Out restaurants near Berkeley, one on Hegenberger Road near the Oakland airport and one in Pinole.

In-N-Out

The story on California Golden Blogs was shared on Facebook 398 times, and picked up by The Bold Italic who described the prank as “a really cruel hoax” — proving that, even with a joke, people wanted this to be true.

In'N'Out

But there may be hope. Matthew Brueckmann, a junior at UC Berkeley, started an online Change.org petition asking In-N-Out to open in Berkeley. It has already garnered more than 1,200 signatures. Many of them came today after the hoax.

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Frances Dinkelspiel, Berkeleyside and CItyside co-founder, is a journalist and author. Her first book, Towers of Gold: How One Jewish Immigrant Named Isaias Hellman Created California, published in November...