PARIS - French QSR chain Quick announced earlier last week that it would nearly triple its line of halal hamburger restaurants, as sales during a trial run had doubled, Reuters reports.

Quick said its decision comes after a trial in eight areas with strong Muslim concentrations generated a doubling of customers and an increase in the amounts that they spent. The company emphasized that its move was one prompted by commercial interests only.

"We're in a very competitive market and we're the challenger," said General Manager Jacques-Edouard Charret, whose company competes against about 1,150 outlets for the U.S.-based McDonald's. "We are not a philanthropy or a charity... Our ambition is to develop Quick's turnover and create jobs. And it's going well."

Quick was criticized earlier this year when it began its halal trial, and Agriculture Minister Bruno Le Maire said ethnic marketing was against French values.

However, France's halal market is nearly double that for organic food, with five million Muslims making up Europe's largest Islamic minority. A survey earlier this year pegged the French halal market at 5.5 billion euros ($6.95 billion U.S.) annually with 20 percent growth per year.

Quick said the halal restaurants would still sell alcohol as do other outlets, and offer non-halal hamburgers on demand that are prepared offsite and reheated in the restaurant.