Buc-ee’s is the fillin’ station of the New South

I believe it was William Shakespeare who first said, “Get thee to a Buc-ee’s,” in his 1603 groundbreaking work, “Hamlet.”

And folks traveling the South’s major highways have been flocking to the always open convenience-store-on- steroids ever since.

Much has been written and broadcasted about the chain of gas stations since Arch “Beaver” Aplin III opened the original location Clute, Texas, in 1982. You can learn about its history from its website and enjoy these pieces in Texas Monthly, Southern Living and, most recently, USA Today.

We spent the equivalent of a work week on the road this holiday season, and I’m here to report that Buc-ee the Beaver has become inescapable. With simple billboards proclaiming the next Buc-ee’s location hundreds of miles away, curiosity alone will compel you to stop in.

We first experienced Buc-ee’s way back in 2015. We were driving back to Georgia after visiting my brothers in Texas for Christmas, and the giant, gleaming complex filled the night sky. The illuminated yellow circle with a red-capped beaver in the middle called to us like the Bat Signal, and we succumbed to its siren song.

At the time, I just wrote it off to the old adage, “Everything’s bigger in Texas.” Now that Buc-ee’s has expanded beyond its home state and boasts 47 locations in Alabama, Missouri, Georgia, Tennessee, South Carolina and Florida, it’s time to unpack the ways in which Buc-ee’s epitomizes the New South:

It’s big. The Sevierville, Tenn., store is officially the world’s largest convenience store at 74,707 square feet, but all locations are bigger than your average gas station. There are so many fueling stations and the parking lot is so big they need a traffic cop. And that’s just the exterior. When you get inside, you feel like you have just entered the world’s busiest Walmart. During our visit, our party became separated and took 20 minutes to reconnect. When we left, I joked that we should take the tram back out to the parking lot to find our minivan.

It’s bold. There is nothing subtle about Buc-ee’s. You can’t miss them. In addition to the aforementioned billboards, they are located in more rural areas and are often one of the only establishments at their exit. At night you can see the lights for miles, and it’s easy to mistake it for a football stadium off in the distance. With bright yellows and reds, Buc-ee’s demands your attention.

It’s branded. Everything, and I mean everything, has the buck-toothed beaver logo on it. As a communications and marketing professional, my hat is off to them for the brand consistency. They adhere to their brand standards like no other retail establishment I’ve seen, and the stripped down logo doesn’t feel the need to give you too much information. If you’ve seen the beaver in the red cap without knowing its association with Buc-ee’s, you’ve no doubt been driven by curiosity to find out what it means. They have so much merchandise with the logo, including apparel, that the brand has spread far beyond the footprint of its store locations.

It’s state-of-the-art. They have almost every type of fuel for your vehicle that you can imagine from diesel to non-ethanol gasoline and even electric vehicle charging stations. I didn’t see a pump for cars that run on moonshine whiskey, but that might be because I wasn’t at the Tennessee location. This year, we visited the Warner Robins location, which is actually in Fort Valley, Georgia. And while the inventory appeals to a more rustic customer profile, the store itself is high tech.

It’s clean. The most important attribute for a roadside stop-off is the cleanliness of the restrooms. Buc-ee’s facilities are clean and mammoth. There are so many toilets that even the line to the women’s room moves quickly during peak occupancy. I wouldn’t eat my brisket sandwich in the bathroom, but it’s so clean that you could.

It’s efficient. I’ve taken to heart Stephen Covey’s habit for highly effective people, “Begin with the end in mind.” When I walk into a new situation, I immediately begin assessing how long it’s going to take to get out. I assure you, the time you spend in Buc-ee’s will not be elongated by the checkout process. There are always plenty of registers open, and like the newfangled drive throughs at Chick-fil-A, that get you out of there quickly.

It’s fun. I don’t need to stop at every Buc-ee’s I see, but they do break up a long road trip nicely. We couldn’t help ourselves and had our picture made with Santa Buc-ee. What could be more fun than that? Carlton had a fun new Buc-ee’s hoodie, I loaded up on praline pecans, and everyone got some kind of sandwich from breakfast biscuits to brisket on bun. The combination of BBQ and candied nuts creates an aroma that should be bottled as aromatherapy. There’s no happier smell on earth.

So if you have not yet had your own Buc-ee’s experience, it’s high time you heeded Shakespeare’s advice and stopped in for some Beaver nuggets or sampled the jerky bar. If it helps, you can even pretend you are conducting sociological research or ironically buying that $30 beaver-emblazoned hoodie.

Be forewarned: you will spend more than you expected to, and, despite all, you will find yourself smiling about it.

Have you been to Buc-ee’s? What was your experience? Leave a comment with your review.