Truck Stop Credo: Keep On Buyin’ : Gift Ideas for the Last-Minute Shopper--Even on Dec. 25

If you’re in the market for a refrigerator that plugs into your cigarette lighter, it’s definitely the place to go.

Or if at 3 o’clock in the morning-- any morning, even Christmas morning--you suddenly feel the need for a new pair of Durango boots (the ones displayed across from the Hostess Twinkies), it’s a predictably friendly place to shop.

Whether it’s dog food or a diamond ring you’re after, DMSO (the paint solvent used by some to treat arthritis) or gold-plated lug nut covers, an ashtray deodorizer or a “talking” (audio cassette) trivia game, it’s likely to be sold at a truck stop. Twenty-four hours a day, 365 days a year.

Upscale Prices

The prices may be a little upscale, but where else can you get a free shower and a parking spot for your semi-truck thrown in with a tank of gas ($300 worth, perhaps)?

For the holidays, truck stops are going all out with tiny, rig-sized Christmas wreaths and trees (complete with lights), lots of 12-volt VCRs, “bear paw” ice scrapers with built-in gloves, ever-popular “fuzz busters” (radar detectors), Long Haul jeans (made with stretch fabric and cut larger in the seat) and toys galore, prominent among them remote-controlled 18-wheelers.

At many truck stops, gift wrapping and shipping are provided gratis. And purchases can be charged on truck stop credit cards.

Since the late 1950s, truck stops have been adding retail stores to their standard offerings of restaurants, gas stations and shower facilities. And over the years those retail operations have become far more than the glorified convenience stores they resemble at first glance.

They are clearly more than stores. They are shopping experiences. In fact, they are giving new meaning to the term one-stop shopping. Truck stop wares are so diverse, it’s now possible for truckers to do all of their holiday buying without ever leaving the highway.

Take Sierra Sid’s ’76 Auto Truck Plaza in Sparks, Nev., for instance. Manager Sid Doan sells all the usual items found at truck stops--items like bunk warmers that operate off cigarette lighters. (Virtually all appliances at truck stops come with cords that plug into lighters.)

$400,000 Worth of Clocks

But Doan loves top-of-the-line grandfather clocks. He says he’s sold more than $400,000 worth of them at his truck stop in the last two years. And he’s currently spending $43,000 on new shelving and a security system he thinks will further exalt his bottom line by preventing theft.

“Most truck stops today have retail stores and they’re enlarging them because a store is a good profit center,” observed Buzz Moore, president of Wendy’s Specialty, an East Moline, Ill., firm that has been outfitting truck stop stores, sometimes completely, for 20 years.

“There is a need throughout the industry for new capital improvement,” concurred Ron Ziegler, former press secretary to President Richard Nixon who now works as president of the National Assn. of Truck Stop Operators. “Many truck stops are expanding and there is a trend to upscale, absolutely.”

Most truck stop stores are now so complete that drivers such as Albuquerque-based Barbara Lee can say flatly that she and her husband buy “everything” at truck stops. “We get our clothes, our toiletries, our cards, everything at truck stops,” Lee said while shopping at the Union 76 truck stop in Ontario. “I’ll probably do all my Christmas shopping at truck stops because it’s so convenient.”

Any complaints? “It would be nice if they had a bigger line of dog food.”

For Lee, like most drivers, the appeal of truck stop shopping is simple. It’s nearly impossible to take an 18-wheeler anyplace else.

Trapped Audience

But some drivers resent that they constitute a trapped audience and they object to the higher prices frequently encountered at truck stops.

“They’re too expensive,” complained Wayne Hine, a driver who operates out of Little Rock. “They have you over a barrel here because a lot of shopping centers have signs saying ‘No Trucks Allowed.’ You can check the prices in a truck stop and then go to a K mart. It’ll be quite a bit higher at the truck stop. Some things, though, like electrical items for your truck, you can’t find them anyplace but a truck stop. In that regard, it’s an asset.”

Many truck stop managers readily admit to the higher prices. “It’s because of our higher overhead,” explained John Griffith, the facility marketing manager at the Truckstops of America (TA) truck stop in Ontario. “When they (drivers) refuel, they get a free shower. They get free banking services. And they get free parking.”

A spokesman for the Union 76 chain of truck stops also acknowledges that prices tend to be higher in his company’s retail stores.

“The retail price will be a little higher for two reasons,” he said, requesting anonymity. “We’re the biggest in the business but our truck stops are leased. The managers of the stores do their own buying, so they don’t buy in great volume to get lower prices. And the shipping costs (many truckers send their purchases to other places) are significant, sometimes 5% of the cost of an item.”

With more than 200 truck stops, Union 76 is the country’s largest truck stop chain. Sohio-owned Truckstops of America, with about 30, is the second largest, and likes to think of itself as “the Cadillac of truck stops.” Many in the industry agree that the chain’s emphasis on upgrading facilities is responsible for much of the remodeling in the rest of the industry.

Truck Shoppers’ Paradise

Both 76 and TA have their highest volume truck stop stores in the Western United States at the same location in Southern California: at the Milliken Avenue exit off the San Bernardino Freeway in Ontario. Between the two retail stores, there’s a virtual truck shoppers’ paradise.

At the Union 76 retail store, manager Barbara Northrop’s sales are hitting around $100,000 a month since fall and she expects those for December will be about $102,000 or $103,000 for her 1,500-square-foot outlet. (December sales at truck stops are not that much higher than the rest of the year, she indicated, because Christmas week is a slow week and many drivers are home with their families.)

Among Northrop’s hot Christmas items are radar detectors, electric coolers, leather and suede vests and, of course, chrome.

Chrome lightning bolts. Chrome lug nut covers. Chrome initials. And chrome silhouettes of shapely bodies (since the increase in female truck drivers, there are now silhouettes of male bodies as well as the more familiar traditional female silhouettes).

“These guys, the truck is their home and they dress it up to make it look real pretty,” Northrop said, referring to her selection of chrome items.

But if you buy something from Northrop’s store, don’t tell her it’s overpriced. “We tell them (complainers) they haven’t been shopping in the real world lately,” she smiled. “And you can’t take showers at K mart or park your truck there.”

While the merchandise in Northrop’s store is crowded into every available nook and cranny, items are less jammed across the street at the TA truck stop. That truck stop even has room for displays of potted plants and a huge Christmas tree, just outside the 2,500-square-foot retail store.

Griffith, the Ontario TA truck stop’s facilities marketing manager, said that this year he’s selling jewelry priced at up to $450 (gold and diamond rings as well as necklaces and bracelets made of “tri-color” gold) and can’t keep 12-volt VCRs in stock. But his biggest-selling new item is the “shifter boot,” which he described as a “beauty item” to dress up the gear shift.

Monthly Sales Volume

“All the California stuff sells great because we’re in California,” he continued, citing monthly sales volume at anywhere from $85,000 to $110,000.

In addition, Griffith said, his store sometimes tries out items for the rest of the chain as California preferences tend to lead the rest of the country--eventually. “We’re kind of the feelers for the marketing department. Right now we’re trying out (reading) glasses that have lights on each side. And we’ll be putting in a line of books on tape and self-improvement cassettes.”

The latter may particularly interest the cashiers who work in truck stop stores. They point out that one of the key differences between truck stop stores and other retail establishments is the occasionally rude manner of the customers.

“There’s never a dull moment. We get some real nice customers but we get some crazy ones, too. A lot of times they’re gruff and tough,” noted Nora Roberts, one of the cashiers at the Union 76 truck stop in Ontario.

“You learn, though, that they don’t really mean it. Normally, they’re in a hurry or they can’t get a load out and they’re stuck here. You’re the first person they talk to when they get off the road.”

But even if they’re gruff and tough, all customers are clearly prized as competition heats up among truck stops. As Roberts described what happened when the TA truck stop opened its doors in Ontario, “We were a little paranoid when they opened across the street. But we found out there’s more than enough business for both of us.”