- You know, abbreviations are everywhere these days, LOL, OMG, ASAP, just to name a few, but at one Chapel Hill Restaurant, the most common phrase is three other letters, BLT.

As Rob Holiday reports, the bacon, lettuce and tomato BLT sandwich has made Merritt's Grill an institution in Chapel Hill and far beyond.

[acoustic guitar music] - [Rob] We've probably all seen the assembly line for building Model Ts, but how about one for building BLTs?

At Merritt's Grill in Chapel Hill the sandwich construction process is a fine art, the perfect balance between speed and culinary perfection.

- Merritt's is known for the BLT sandwich, just a great combination.

Bacon, lettuce, tomato, sourdough.

We want our bacon to be the best, our bread to be always fresh.

Our freshest lettuce, tomatoes, best mayonnaise we can find.

- Having the right ingredients for everything is key.

- It was really good.

I thought it was amazing.

The bacon is nice and crispy and it went well with everything else.

- BLT, it's always the same no matter how many years have passed.

Tomatoes are really juicy, but it doesn't make the sandwich too soggy, which is really important.

The bacon is very flavorful, but it's not too greasy.

- I'm getting lunch with my friends and I have awesome tomato, which I don't really get very often as a student with student meals.

- [John] We have four different sizes of the BLT.

We have a baby, a single, double, and a triple.

- [Rob] Each BLT is fully customizable, the contents and the bread that holds it all together.

- Go-to is definitely the double BLT, add pimento cheese.

The bacon, the bread, as you can tell, it's high quality.

- This was the double, so it's like nine slices of bacon.

You can even go to the triple, which is like a whole pound of bacon.

So I haven't seen that much bacon on a sandwich elsewhere.

- Any given day we're cooking around 300, maybe 300, 400 pounds of bacon, just to have that little cushion for the next day.

- We go through about 2,200 pounds of bacon a week.

75 to 85 boxes of tomatoes, 14 to 18 cases of lettuce every week.

- [Rob] BLTs are the big attraction, accounting for about 65% of Merritt's Grill sales, but there are other mainstays on the menu.

- Obviously the BLTs are most popular.

The Linda Woods chicken salad, egg salad, pimento cheese sandwich, burgers, hot dogs, pulled pork.

- We added a a Reuben sandwich this year and have had great response to that.

We have a sausage, egg and cheese, bacon, egg and cheese.

We do a bologna, egg and cheese.

- It was awesome.

I was very eager to try it when I came to school here.

I never ate here, so basically this is my first trip.

I wish I'd tried it a lot earlier.

- [Rob] Bacon and bread bring folks through the door these days, but in the beginning it was breaks and bearings.

- Merritt's started in 1929 as a gas station.

There was a two car garage, which is where the kitchen currently is now.

They would do tuneups and oil changes in there, and eventually it kind of transitioned into a mini mart.

Current entity of what it is now started in the early 90s.

The Britts had bought it and Robin Britt was serving her BLTs and people just got captivated by her personality and the sandwich and the delicious fresh ingredients.

- John Toogood and his family bought Merritt's from the Britt family in 2021, and immediately got to work making changes without losing the taste and traditions that have made Merritt's a Chapel Hill institution.

Merritt's still has the same vintage vibe it's always had, but there's also a focus on technology.

You can now order on your phone, and that's helped transform the experience in an exciting way.

- We changed the kitchen around so that we could produce the sandwiches quickly.

We also changed the inside with our technology.

When I first started here, people were waiting 30-40 minutes, but people were happy when they got their sandwiches, whereas now they still do the same thing, but they're waiting one to two minutes for their sandwich.

- [John] We've added a large umbrella out front.

We have heaters, we've added a lot of tables to the back patio and the bamboo.

- Up for Jesse.

- Everybody truly enjoys working here.

We truly are a family, taking care of people, and and seeing them walk out of here knowing that they had a really good meal, fresh made, and great customer service.

- We'd like you just to kind of feel that we love you and that the food is here just to make you feel good.

We just want it to be a comfortable, relaxing place to enjoy lunch.

- Merritt's Store and Grill is at 1009 South Columbia Street in Chapel Hill, and they're open Monday through Saturday from 7:00 a.m.

to 4:00 p.m.

To find out more, give them a call at [919] 942-4897, or go online to merrittsblt.com.