Gas station food has come a long way. I remember on our travels to and from North Carolina when I was a kid, if you stopped at a Gulf Station to get gas (and hopefully a rest room break) if there was any food at all to be had, it was a pack of peanuts on the counter and a Coke from the machine. Slowly but surely gas stations recognized an unfilled market and began offering chips and nabs, maybe a Honeybun and packages of cookies.
I don’t know which gas station chain first began offering a range of real food, but now they all do – or they go out of business. A company like Sheetz can make more profit on a large Frosty and a bag of chips than do selling a full tank of gas.
Locally, Sheetz and Wawa are in a full-blown food war. If they offer the best food, they get your gas business, plus odds and ends that add to the bottom line. Surprisingly, both have pretty good food. They have kiosks where you can place your order for a sub or a hot dog, tacos, and the like.
The service is usually fairly quick, but I hate ordering like that. I want a real live human taking my order. But I digress.
In the modern gas station food competition, one clearly stands out and that is Royal Farms.
Royal Farms is a privately owned chain of convenience store/gas stations headquartered in Baltimore, with some 250 stores in Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Virginia, West Virginia, and North Carolina. And they serve in-house Fried Chicken that rivals KFC.
I first came across a Royal Farms station on the Eastern Shore of Virginia. When I went inside, the aroma of Fried Chicken was overwhelming. I wasn’t even hungry and ordered a bucket and it was spot on.
As we were driving back from Atlanta after the holidays, I saw that they had a store south of Lynchburg. If we had a Royal Farms in Charlottesville, they would get both my gas and chicken business.
Also, when Royal Farms opens a station, they don’t just match the competitors’ prices. They beat them soundly, usually by 10c a gallon.
If you ever see a Royal Farms station during your travels, stop in and get some chicken, even if your gas tank is full.
