Have you been to a Buc-Ees?
Hundreds of pumps. It's a goddamned ocean of concrete and steel. You can use the main building as a shelter for a mid-sized town and have enough bathrooms. It's a fucking department store serving as a gas station.
They're goddamned massive.
Hundreds of pumps And no open ones because everyone parks and sits there while they go inside
Yeah, sadly, it seems no matter how ample the parking, people will still just take a pump.
I kinda get it, but at this point, we should all know better. Leave one person behind to pump and park, you're going to be in the building for awhile just trying to get snacks and get checked out. I've never seen our local less than packed inside.
I randomly went to one a few weeks ago thinking it was just a truck stop. I was not prepared for that.
It's just unnecessarily huge. I've never seen so many gas pumps in my life. Or so many toilets. It's honestly absurd and made me feel existential dread. It's like everything wrong with America all in one convenient pit stop. I couldn't even enjoy the wall of jerky. Bathrooms were nice, though.
Ever been to a walmart in a small town on saturday?
Where the only thing to do in town is go to the walmart.....
Its that but with enough gas pumps to fuel the military
It's a Wal Mart supercenter combined with a mall food court masquerading as a gas station. With about 250 fuel pumps outside. I dont think I'm exaggerating.
And it's explicitly not a truck stop. No fueling pumps for big rigs.
It’s good advertising. People see the funny billboard and snap a pic for social media.
It's a destination "gas station". There's a restaurant called Lamberts that sort of does the same thing.
I'm not even sure what a "destination gas station" means. I see some big ones on our road trips, and all I ever do is stop at whatever one has a reasonable price, then take off.
Who are these for?
Ew...
My favorite gas station is Costco because it's cheap and there's no stupid ads on the pumps. The second best is probably Maverick because they generally have pretty clean bathrooms.
They're like a super store, but also have gas and impressively good BBQ sandwiches. They sale a bit of everything. Like an ikea for road trips.
Huh, weird. Are prices reasonable? Or are they typical gas station prices where it's way cheaper to just hit a grocery store first?
For road trips, I usually just hit a grocery store the night before and don't bother with actually going into any convenience stores the entire trip.
They're right off the interstate, typically at about the intervals you'd pit stop anyway, so convenience is a factor.
The food is pretty decent for fast food, tons of snack selection including lots of their house brand, at least a dozen flavors of their jerky. Prices are somewhere between grocery store and convenience store, but some of their house brand stuff is pretty competitive. They've got a lot of clothing and housewares, think like a cross between a Cracker Barrel and a Target. Gas is typically reasonable for the region in my experience, bathrooms are famously clean.
It's kind of the perfect spot to stop for gas on a trip: stretch your legs, pee, grab a hot sandwich, maybe some flavored popcorn to snack on later, grab a blanket with a big beaver face on it cuz the kid's trying to sleep in the back and you forgot to pack one. It's a true one stop shop.
Their gas prices are always cheaper than anything else you'll find just of the highway. They literally lose money on gas sales - just so you will possibly buy something in the store.
The prices in the store aren't cheap (about what you'd expect from a highway-side gas station), but you can get all kinds of stuff in there. BBQ, roasted nuts, deli sandwiches, fudge, and some of the best beef jerky around
I mean, it makes sense. What kind of psychopath goes to a buc-ees and only gets gas? That's like going to Disney World and only riding the tram.
There's one in Arizona heading north between Phoenix and Tucson that says 951 miles behind you.
When my family went to see Mount Rushmore, I didn't know what Wall Drugs was. That changed as soon as we hit the state line. Those guys must have more billboards than Alexander Shunnarah.
I think by the time you're halfway though the state, you become slightly brainwashed hahaha
Aaaaaand we're broke... But I got 4 pairs of pajamas, 10 hats, 7 shirts, and 32 bandanas all with cartoon beavers on them. I also got us 14lbs of our favorite jerky, 6lbs of the jerky we always forget we don't like, and 8 different kinds of barbecue sandwiches and wraps. And some Beaver Nuggets.
If everything goes according to plan, we should have enough diarrhea and constipation to wreck every Pilot bathroom from here to El Paso
No coolers, pie fillings, home decor, or kolaches? You didn't buy a rocking chair or a grill while you were there? Are you sure it was even Buc-ees?
When you've got HEB, the Buc-ee's coolers are kinda "meh" in comparison. And their home decor section is just an overpriced miniature Walmart without a single beaver on anything.
As for the kolaches: go to Kolache Factory or visit West, Texas and tell me you can ever eat another kolache anywhere else.
Oh, I'm very familiar with the Czech Shop and Slovacek's. When my brother lived over by Round Rock and we used to play up in Deep Ellum. We'd stop every time on the way and load up. But I'm not driving almost 3 hours for them when I've got reasonable knock offs nearby.
It's the same reason I'll get Barbecue sandwiches there. I've got a bunch of good places actually nearby. However, if I'm on the road I'm guaranteed to get a minimum quality sandwich that's pretty alright on top of clean bathrooms.
But I 100% agree about the Kodi coolers. We've also got the RTIC store over here if you wanna get fancy.
I've been trying to get people to put a beaver on Buc-ees home decor for years. But that's not a conversation for polite company.
I fucking loooove my RTIC half-gallon jug! I suck down and refill that shit more times in a day than a burned-out parent at SeaWorld with a novelty cup
That's not cocky, you're just in the middle of fuck-all nowhere. That Bucees's was the last gas station and you missed it.
Bucc-ee's is love, Bucc-ee's is life. The curse is real. I passed one without stopping and 15 minutes later, a rock shattered my windshield.
I'd never heard of Buc-ees, and now I see that's because they're only in Texas. The only time I've been there, besides in an airport for a layover, was in 2014 when I drove on the 40 through Amarillo. According to Google maps, there is a (closed) Bucc-ees on the 40, but it looks like it was built very recently as it isn't there in 2023, the latest images on there.
They're spreading to states near Texas. Like a cancer that is, admittedly, nicer than most rest stops but is still just some fucking brand that reminds you the average person is a programmed chimp for making any kind of deal out of them.
I looked up some pictures of them and they are admittedly a spectacle, unmistakably American.
My town was supposed to get a bucees, but they were requiring that the town expand the road to accommodate the immense amount of traffic that a bucees pulls in. Fortunately they got told to pound sand and they backed out. I like bucees. I think they're overrated AF, but I do appreciate a nice rest stop. What I don't want is one anywhere near where I live. I went to one one time where the traffic was backed out onto the interstate.
Because America is so expansive the next Buc-ees in that direction is probably 800 miles away.
People are crazy for bucees. It's a road trip staple. It wouldn't surprise me if the idea behind this is to get people to reroute their road trips next time just to stop at bucees.