Posted on 07/24/2015 5:53:31 AM PDT by TurboZamboni
MOORHEAD, Minn. — The Dairy Queen in downtown Moorhead has been thumbing its nose at corporate HQ pretty much since it opened in 1949, despite some efforts from the home office to have the store mind its Ds and Qs.
And it’s a recipe that seems to be working for one of the few DQs in the country still operating under a 66-year-old contract that allows them to dish up throwback treats alongside the standard corporate-approved items, a combination that turns Main Avenue and 8th Street into a hopping, slightly retro summer hangout.
Though the restaurant shuts down in the winter and unlike newer shops has no indoor seating and no drive-thru, customers gladly line up on the sidewalk for frosty treats no matter what the weather. Two years ago at least 1,200 people showed up on opening day, March 1. The temperature was 11-below.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
A story I can really sink my teeth into!
Dairy Queen will always have a special place in my heart. When I was a kid, ours was the same way - on Main Street, USA, no indoor seating, closed in winter, no drive-thru and people lined up around the block all summer long.
Drinking a, ‘Mr. Misty Kiss’ (like a Slushy) too fast gave me quite a few headaches throughout my youth. :)
They did away with butterscotch for malts. Then they did away with cherry. I’m not going back to DQ. The new simplified menu sucks. JMHO.
I worked at the DQ in our town for about 3 hours.
They wanted me to weigh the cones to be certain I wasn’t giving the customers too much ice cream. Even as a teenager, I knew that wasn’t the kind of company I wanted to work for.
Dairy Queen is a subsidy of Berkshire Hathaway(A$$HOLE Tax Dodger Warren Buffet).
There was a Dairy Queen located two blocks from my home town high school. The owner became fed up with the parent company’s edicts so he changed the name to Dairy Cream and went on to make a fortune...
Corporate uniformity always touts that it is cheaper, has less wastage, and that customers prefer uniformity over local variations.
While they have some arguments with this, the flip side is also true. Uniformity also means a loss of quality, an inability to exploit local bargains, a very dedicated clientele, and lower customer satisfaction.
Some years ago an interesting paradox happened in city planning. Cities wanted to have family friendly business districts with locally owned stores and a more leisurely pace. The problem is that this is exactly where national retail franchise chains want to be as well.
That is, the corporate chains crave to be surrounded by small, locally owned businesses, not other corporate chains. But *all* the corporate chains want this. And are willing to fight in court to not be excluded, and they have very deep pockets.
And once there is an opening, the corporate chains fight to take over the space of the small, locally owned businesses, pushing them out, and end up turning what had been a pleasant place into just another decaying, dirty corporate chain clog, full of unhappy minimum wage employees, and with an emphasis on “buy then get out, rush, rush, rush!”
Which is exactly the opposite of what was wanted.
I grew up just down 8th street south, from this DQ. Was previously owned by the Bob Litherland family and it sounds like these fine folks are carrying on the Litherland traditions. It’s a hopping place on a hot Moorhead night with ample parking and nice outdoor seating adjacent to the building. When I go back home I always visit this DQ every night. They’re always open, because I never go back in the winter!
I enjoyed their Banana Pudding Blizzards back when I could still find a clean, well-run DQ. I don’t know of one anywhere near me anymore.
I like their Brazier Burgers and their foot-long chili dogs.
But I agree with the poster who said something about Butterscotch, I love a Butterscotch Shake or Malt.
All of the old roadside drive-ins were great and some still exist.
DQ ice cream has a great taste about it, I don’t know what it is that makes it different.
**Corporate uniformity always touts that it is cheaper, has less wastage, and that customers prefer uniformity over local variations.**
Seems to work for Chick-Fil-A.
I have been to this DQ and was amazed to find items I hadn’t seen since I was a kid. The whiz kids at DQ headquarters should take notice and instead of quashing this kind of innovation and catering to local tastes allow franchisees some leeway to better fit the local market. Even Chairman Mao said he didn’t care whether the cat was white or black as long as it caught mice.
Sounds fun! The small town that my high school was in had a DQ. Love the ice cream.
This could just be a vicious rumor but when I was a kid, I heard that Dairy Queen got pregnant when Burger King forgot to wrap his Whopper.
We have a DQ in South Bend that has been aound since the 50s.
No inside seating... hot dogs, cones, slushies and sundays, that’s it. Boy owns it now, little Gold mine.
That would be Chairman Deng; Chairman Mao said, among other things, that power comes from the barrel of a gun.
I love D.Q. We go there all the time.
He must be in his eighties.
Any pictures of his mom Jane in sight?
What were you supposed to do if it weighed too much? Scrape some off the top? Add some if it weighed too little?
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