BCS Coming & Going: Retail, Restaurants, Businesses, etc (2021)

458,787 Views | 1380 Replies | Last: 2 yr ago by australopithecus robustus
MsDoubleD81
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Frame going up on Gringos.
Geralt of Rivia
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Howdy's announced they are closing
Tailgate88
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Geralt of Rivia said:

Howdy's announced they are closing
WHAT? Geez every time I drive by there I see cars in the drive through. My son used to work there and they were always busy? Their pizza was fantastic and unique. Didn't they win best pizza in the Brazos Valley a couple times?

Edit, from their webpage. Hopefully they will be reopening, but apparently between Covid and supply chain/increased prices it became untenable.

Quote:

Sadly, we must announce that Howdy's Texas Grill'd Pizza will be permanently closing our South College Station location. This coming Sunday, December 5th, 2021 will be our last day of operations.
In 2016, we started Howdy's with the dream of bringing something new to College Station, and to pizza in general. That dream was to create a style of pizza that celebrated Texas food traditions, and our goal was to make College Station the home of Texas-style pizza. Something we hoped to spread around the state and beyond with BCS forever being known as the home of "Texas-style Grilled Pizza", just like how Lockhart/Elgin is the undeniable home of Central Texas BBQ.

Since we opened our restaurant in March 2019 in South College Station, we've had the extreme pleasure of serving our Texas-style grilled pizza to thousands and thousands of you. We've made hundreds of thousands of pizzas for this community. We've been a part of your lives, your birthday and holiday celebrations, your date nights, your post-game celebrations, school fundraisers, church socials, and even many weddings.

We even have had the deep honor of serving the Aggie faithful Texas-style grilled pizza at Kyle Field for the last two years. It's been our profound privilege to share our love of pizza and Texas food traditions with all of you.

We are proud of our team, and their dedication and hard work which has earned your vote for "Best Pizza" in the Eagle Reader's Choice Awards every year since we opened our doors, and last year in the Best of the Brazos. Those awards mean so much because they came from you, our neighbors recognizing the effort and quality of what our team worked so hard to help us bring to you. We're grateful to God and to you for the opportunity to be a part of the BCS community.

Like so many of our fellow independent restaurants, these last two years have been nothing short of a nightmare scenario. As a new business, it's been a devastating time, to be honest. We have fought through lockdowns, quarantining staff, enhanced COVID protocols, national staffing shortages, supply chain interruptions, and more to get to today. In the end, our business just never bounced back to the Pre-Covid/early lockdown numbers we needed to survive and move forward.

In the last year, we have been fighting a losing battle against a staffing crisis, radically rising labor costs to keep the people we have, and costs rising exponentially on our ingredients and in every other expense category. All of this is on top of decreased sales, interruptions to our supply chain, and more than we can share here. We have to trust God has everything in His hands ultimately. We don't know what the future holds, but it's clearly going to be different than we imagined it.

We also must acknowledge and thank our families, who have sacrificed more than you could ever know to be in a service business during this global pandemic. Other restaurant and essential service business owners will know exactly what we're talking about.

For the rest of the week (Wednesday - Sunday), we are going to be open for dinner service only from 4:00 pm to 8:00 pm each day. We will be selling what we have in stock, and when we run out that will be the end of it. Our hope is to make it through Sunday, but we may close earlier if we sell out of stock. If you have gift cards, please come use them.

Our goal is to restructure and reopen in a different location in the fall of next year if not sooner.
But, like everything in this crazy world, we're investing all our plans into God's hands. We'll keep you updated as we know more, and the next steps solidify.

For now, we plan on taking the holidays to be with our families, get some much-needed rest, and refocus with some fresh perspective in the New Year.

Lastly, please support locally-owned small businesses and especially restaurants. These are exceptionally precarious times and there are many beloved places here in town that are walking a razor-thin line of survival. Be gracious with them as well, they are fighting through such a tremendous headwind just to keep their doors open and even minimal levels of staffing. We know for a fact that they need your support, and that we as a community need them.

We genuinely hope to see you again in the fall, and hopefully, you will welcome us back in whatever form that takes. Regardless, we are grateful to you for inviting us into your lives and making us a part of your community these last three years. We'll miss seeing all of your smiling faces and serving you delicious Texas-style grilled pizza more than you can possibly know.

God bless y'all,
Howdy's Pizza Owners

Esteban du Plantier
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Tailgate88 said:

Geralt of Rivia said:

Howdy's announced they are closing
WHAT? Geez every time I drive by there I see cars in the drive through. My son used to work there and they were always busy? Their pizza was fantastic and unique. Didn't they win best pizza in the Brazos Valley a couple times?


They had a line because they were sloooooow.

You can be really popular but still go out of business if you can only make 2 pizzas an hour.

After them being 30 or so minutes later than they told to me to be there, I just stopped going.
KidDoc
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That stinks I really like having Howdy's and Rx Pizza right next to each other so I had easy options. But that proximity kind of explains part of the issues aside from supply chain/COVID/worker shortage issues.
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AggiePhil
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We also quit going to Howdys due to the insane wait
RyanFromTexas
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Geralt of Rivia said:

Howdy's announced they are closing
Oh man, this is such a downer!

They did obviously have some operational issues with staffing, training, and keeping everything in supply (last time I was there they were out of black olives), but this is a huge huge loss.

The pizzas were unique and of high quality with generous amounts of toppings and reasonably priced for feeding a lot of people (we have a large family). The salads weren't bad either.

DD will not suffice.
maroon barchetta
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You people that complain about waiting…do you not order in advance and have it ready when you get there?
toolshed
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Yep. And still had to wait a couple times for 20-45 minutes longer than the "ready" time.

We still went because we loved the pizza, we just knew to expect a wait.

I'm sure being next door to another pizza place isn't helpful, especially one with a bar. We actually prefer Howdy's over RX.
trouble
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Howdy's Cobb salad is my favorite.
AggiePhil
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maroon barchetta said:

You people that complain about waiting…do you not order in advance and have it ready when you get there?
First part, yes. Second part, no. Even when we ordered ahead, Howdy's couldn't get it right.
maroon barchetta
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Geez. Ok. Didn't know they had gotten that slow.
ElephantRider
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We went one night last week and there was no one else there. It was still slow.

Being so close to Rx probably didn't help either
Esteban du Plantier
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maroon barchetta said:

Geez. Ok. Didn't know they had gotten that slow.


Add to this that on a Friday or Saturday night, you'd need to get your order placed the moment they opened if you wanted a quoted pickup time before the kids' bedtime.

Then it was 30 minutes after that quoted time that you actually got your food.
aggiepaintrain
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RX Banana Pudding is fantastic
FJB
techno-ag
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T&P about Howdy's. I know Charlie Mac tried his hand at an independent pizza restaurant for a while too. It must be a tough market sector.
Buy a man eat fish, he day, teach fish man, to a lifetime.

- Joe Biden

I think that, to be very honest with you, I do believe that we should have rightly believed, but we certainly believe that certain issues are just settled.

- Kamala Harris
theNetSmith
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well, I heard it was all your fault b/c all you ever did was drive by and notice how many people were at the drive thru instead of adding yourself to the queue
PS3D
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techno-ag said:

T&P about Howdy's. I know Charlie Mac tried his hand at an independent pizza restaurant for a while too. It must be a tough market sector.


CM's pizza venture tried to go upscale when there was no real reason or market for. He took a fairly average independent pizza place and ran it into the ground. Pesto isn't cheap.

And didn't Howdy's change hands before opening? The original logo was green and the place was part finished before they changed everything again.
AgProgrammer
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Howdy's was somewhere we'd visit about once every two weeks. Always did enjoy the pizza and salads. But the wait has always been frustrating. We went last week for a late lunch. We were the only ones there and it still took well over 30 minutes for our pizza to come out. They were out of napkins and drink lids. I said then "this place is about to close". Sad to hear I thought correctly.

They went through a phase at the beginning of Covid where when they were open was very random. We'd drive up on a Thursday for lunch and they were closed but would be open the next day. Then the following week closed on Friday. I got an email one day about some lunch special for that day, went there for lunch and they were closed. So I imagine that if a family went there only to find them randomly closed, they'd quit trying to go there after that happens a couple of times.
Captn_Ag05
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Highlights from the latest College Station Planning and Development submissions

  • New Aggieland Outfitters building at corner of Bush and Fairview
  • Midtown City Center Recreation Center and Pool (946 Town Lake Drive)
  • New law office off Fitch (551 William D Fitch Parkway)
  • McDonalds at corner of Wellborn and Holleman
Koko Chingo
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Is the McDonalds at Wellborn & Holleman due to the (one day in the future) construction to bypass the railroad tracks at George Bush & Wellborn. Would that construction force the existing McDonalds to be tore down?




Captn_Ag05
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I believe that is the case. Same reason that Aggieland Outfitters is relocating just down George Bush a bit from their current location.
UmustBKidding
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McDonald's is moving to holeman and wellborn where the valero was. Old location will be in a big hole.
FlyRod
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Bought a pile of stuff at Zeitman's grocery/deli, holy cow I'll be a regular there. I'll probably end up with gout like Bobby Hill did in that King of the Hill episode.
maroon barchetta
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FlyRod said:

Bought a pile of stuff at Zeitman's grocery/deli, holy cow I'll be a regular there. I'll probably end up with gout like Bobby Hill did in that King of the Hill episode.


Don't get gout.

There is a thread on Outdoors about gout that I saw on the past that gave me shivers. Holy crud it sounds miserable.
Marooned_n_Aggieland
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Uncorked at the Yard project registered with expected completion 3/31/2022.
This will be the new location for the old Downtown Uncorked.
Koko Chingo
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I cannot remember it it is supposed to be an underpass or overpass at that intersection?

I wish they would have done the construction at George Bush & Wellborn along with leveling out the Holleman & Wellborn intersection while the students were taking classes online.

I would imagine they are going to combine all of these things along with a McDonalds grand opening.

The left turn from Welborn to George Bush will backed up to Barron road, lol.
Rex Racer
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Koko Chingo said:

I cannot remember it it is supposed to be an underpass or overpass at that intersection?

I wish they would have done the construction at George Bush & Wellborn along with leveling out the Holleman & Wellborn intersection while the students were taking classes online.

I would imagine they are going to combine all of these things along with a McDonalds grand opening.

The left turn from Welborn to George Bush will backed up to Barron road, lol.
Bush will go underneath Wellborn, if I remember correctly.
CEAg78
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Koko Chingo said:



I wish they would have done the construction at George Bush & Wellborn along with leveling out the Holleman & Wellborn intersection while the students were taking classes online.



I don't think you understand either funding or construction of a project like this. Neither can be completed in a year.

See also "shovel-ready projects", circa Obama administration.
Somebody has to lose. Might as well be t.u.
maroon barchetta
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CEAg78 said:

Koko Chingo said:



I wish they would have done the construction at George Bush & Wellborn along with leveling out the Holleman & Wellborn intersection while the students were taking classes online.



I don't think you understand either funding or construction of a project like this. Neither can be completed in a year.

See also "shovel-ready projects", circa Obama administration.


Those are going to help infrastructure!
Koko Chingo
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maroon barchetta said:

CEAg78 said:

Koko Chingo said:



I wish they would have done the construction at George Bush & Wellborn along with leveling out the Holleman & Wellborn intersection while the students were taking classes online.



I don't think you understand either funding or construction of a project like this. Neither can be completed in a year.

See also "shovel-ready projects", circa Obama administration.


Those are going to help infrastructure!
I totally get it and am all for both projects. This was just one of those dream statements, "Wouldn't it be nice if...."

These projects are a dream.

Years ago I had to deal with the California Coastal Commission for projects and permitting. I am glad those days are over. It took 20+ years for some highway 101 projects to get started because of jumping through permitting and environmental hoops. It seemed like 497 different agencies had a say so about a piece of a project,

trouble
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Raspas El Payasito has closed

https://www.facebook.com/414848711985223/posts/2286469151489827/
ratfacemcdougal
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trouble said:

Raspas El Payasito has closed

https://www.facebook.com/414848711985223/posts/2286469151489827/
They have updated their post to say they are consolidating not completely closing
trouble
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That's better than nothing!
Tailgate88
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Sounds like they bought out Ed's Butcher Block and renamed it Texas Meat Market? Ed passed away a year or two back and I wasn't sure if his family would continue the business or not. Got many a deer processed there over the years.

So they are consolidating the restaurant into the meat market. Best of luck to them - the food is fantastic.
 
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