Faithful subjects welcome Dairy Queen to Palmer

PALMER — Elias Stratton knows what he wants. On Friday it was a cheeseburger and cookie dough Blizzard from the new DQ Grill and Chill in Palmer.

“I wanted to come to Dairy Queen because I haven’t been to one since [living in] Maine,” Stratton said. “And I wanted to be the first in line.”

With a little help from father Ed Stratton, the 10-year-old accomplished his goal by arriving at the Palmer Dairy Queen at 8:30 a.m. — two and a half hours before the new restaurant opened its doors for the first time. Although the father-and-son team had to wait patiently in chilly temperatures and blowing wind, they said it was well worth the wait.

“It’s something my son really wanted to do,” Stratton said. “I’m just glad we didn’t have to camp out last night like he wanted to.”

The grand opening of DQ packed the Evergreen Street restaurant with hamburger hungry residents. Customers filled the sidewalk and the drive-through anxiously awaiting their first bite of food from the Mat-Su Valley’s first Dairy Queen. When the clock finally reached 11 a.m. customers pilled into the building and the DQ crew got to work.

“This is excellent,” said Greg Todd, the franchise owner. “We had a feeling that it was going to be busy.”

One reason Todd predicted a busy grand opening is the success of the DQ Grill and Chill he opened in Anchorage in June. The Anchorage restaurant broke almost every sales record for all Dairy Queen restaurants. Although the Palmer location didn’t surpass Anchorage in single-day sales Friday, it came in a close second. During the 13-hour grand opening, about 900 customers came through the door.

Employees worked diligently to serve customers, but Todd didn’t sit on the sidelines. He directed operations and spent most of his time delivering food to hungry people and welcoming them. Although the owner had to work until midnight, he said all the hard work is worth the effort when he sees how customers react when they get their food.

Darlene Johnson is one of those smiling customers. Similar to the Strattons, she arrived at the restaurant well before it opened and was the third person to place an order.

“Thank God I was here early,” Johnson said, looking at the growing line of people outside the building.

The two hours Johnson stood outside Friday was small potatoes compared to the 40 years it had been since she last ate at a Dairy Queen. Then, her sister worked at a Seattle location.

Contact Chris Gillow at chris.gillow@frontiersman.com or 352-2284.