By Josh Siatkowski | Lead Writer
Ever since I came from Oklahoma City to Baylor in 2023, I’ve noticed a hole in the “Grease Pit” of fast food restaurants on the other side of the highway. It’s a hole that can only be filled by something as Oklahoman as me: Braum’s Ice Cream and Dairy Store.
Akin to Culver’s in the Midwest or the West Coast’s In-n-Out Burger, Braum’s is an Oklahoma-based fast food chain that has expanded to 300 locations across parts of Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas and Texas. Maybe it’s my inner Sooner speaking, but Braum’s is much more than its other regional counterparts. Equal parts restaurant, ice cream parlor and general store, it’s a wonderful machine that can turn the $7 in your car’s center console into five hamburgers, six pints of ice cream or even a bag of groceries.
Yes, those numbers are correct, and they squash the competition. Braum’s is one of the few places where a $10 bill still gets you lunch with some change left over. On the other hand, major cities all average in the double digits for fast food meal prices, according to FOX 7 in Austin.
But there’s a problem: the pink-and-navy logo has only expanded so far, stopping abruptly with its southernmost location in Hillsboro, a 35-mile drive north from Baylor’s campus. It’s close enough to make it worth a road trip, but far enough to make you wish you had one on the other side of the interstate.
There are probably a lot of things students wish were right there for us on the other side of the interstate, to be fair. But this play makes sense: college students are the perfect market for a Braum’s.
For one, it’s dirt cheap. A cup of frozen yogurt will only set you back $1.50. I love Andy’s, but sometimes I don’t need a $7 speciality concrete.
But beyond that, the restaurant is a great option for a late-night outing with friends. While the dining rooms of many fast food restaurants in the Grease Pit remain quiet even with busy drive-thrus, Braum’s offers a more enjoyable experience inside. You can walk up to the counter, watch your ice cream be scooped and mixed right in front of you, and sit down and eat it in a booth. There’s also a grocery store inside, which is great for picking up an extra pint or snacks on your way out.
Even as one of Braum’s biggest supporters, I don’t do my weekly grocery shopping there. But it’s a nice perk.
The food items are no afterthought, either. The Bag of Burgers — a sack of five sixth-pound hamburgers for a few bucks — are a great best bang for your buck, and even better when shared. And some Oklahomans, myself included, even say that Braum’s Sauce outmatches Cane’s Sauce.
The most common problem with expanding a restaurant like Braum’s, which has only one distribution center in Tuttle, Oklahoma, is that most companies have strict requirements on maximum distance between a restaurant and their processing facility. For Braum’s, that maximum distance is 330 miles. The distance from Tuttle to Waco by car reaches about 290 miles.
It seems like the stars are aligned on this.
So to the Braum’s Corporation — it is too late to help me. I’ve already spent the last four years satisfying my fixings through trips to Hillsboro and stays in my hometown of Oklahoma City. But for the thousands of underclassmen here today and here to come, please give them an alternative to $8 milkshakes.
