Lee's Sandwiches located on Santa Clara and 6th Street was packed with customers on Tuesday during the lunch hour.
Lee's Sandwiches features Asian as well as American style sandwiches.
Most of the customers that come to eat at the newest Lee's Sandwiches in San Jose are San Jose State University students and City Hall employees, Le said.
Ali Rahnoma, a junior majoring in sociology at SJSU, said he comes to the sandwich shop on a weekly basis.
"I had a friend who was counting the days until this place opened," Rahnoma said. "The day it opened, he dragged me to come out here. That was my first time, and I've been coming here ever since."
David Tran, manager of the shop, said he estimates the store has been serving about 1,000 customers a day since it opened on May 6.
"I'm very proud of Lee's Sandwiches because (we serve) a lot of non-Asians," Tran said.
"We are refugees. We came over here (and brought) something new to America."
Although Le's parents, Ba Van Le and Hanh Nguyen, opened the first Lee's Sandwiches in 1983 - located on Santa Clara Street in the space Tung Kee Noodle House now occupies - it wasn't until four years ago that the chain began expanding, Le said.
For business reasons, his parents decided to use the more Anglicized spelling of their last name, Lee, for their store, Le said.
"We only had two until 2001," Le said. "Now we have 29 in Northern California, Southern California, Arizona and Texas."
Le said each of the stores is owned and operated by one of his eight brothers and sisters. They try to open one new store every one to two months, he said.
"We've been on target so far," Le said. "There are nine of us, so we have a lot of arms and legs."
Le said it was his late nephew, Minh Le, who came up with the idea of "Americanizing" the then "mom and pop" Vietnamese sandwich shop.
"He told his dad, who's my oldest brother, that Lee's Sandwiches should have a new twist to it," Le said. "A lot of his (non-Asian) friends were making fun of us, saying, 'it kind of smells' and 'the food looks weird.' "
Le said that after Minh died in a motorcycle accident in the spring of 2001, months before he and Le were scheduled to graduate from SJSU, the Le family decided to take Minh's idea and "run with it."
That's when the franchise began to apply what Le calls "the new concept" to its stores.
Le said the chain switched from using rolls to using baguettes and croissants for their sandwiches and developed its Euro menu, which features sandwiches with American deli meats and cheeses. Flavored pearl milk teas and more types of smoothies were added to the menu as well.
The chain has kept its cultural integrity by still offering a wide variety of traditional Vietnamese sandwiches and Lee's Sandwiches' original signature iced coffee, Le said.
Besides adding to the food selection, Le said Lee's Sandwiches shops emphasize the importance of cleanliness, good customer service and efficiency.
Le said one of his brothers developed the chain's point of sales system, which calls out customers' order numbers over a loudspeaker when their food is ready.
Clifford Yip, an SJSU senior majoring in mechanical engineering, said he eats at Lee's because of the prices.
"It's pretty cheap, so the word passed around," Yip said.
Yip's favorite menu item, the roast beef croissant sandwich, sells for $3.75.
Le said the franchise produces its own food supplies, allowing prices to be significantly lower than sandwich shops like Quizno's or Subway.
"We have our own production facilities. We're totally vertically integrated," Le said.
"We make our own meats, the vegetables - all the things that go into the sandwiches."
Tran said that each Lee's Sandwiches shop has its own bakery where a batch of fresh baguettes is baked every other hour.