The Taco Bell That Time Forgot
Usually when you come across a restaurant that still has an outdated sign, building design, or both, its in Podunk, USA, out in the middle of nowhere, in the boondocks, where the only people who would notice don’t much care.
Burger King is usually the biggest offender in this area, in my experience. I’ve seen a BK in western Nebraska that was in a steel shed with the old 1970s logo proudly adorned across both the building and its sign. I’ve seen a BK in a truck stop outside of Des Moines that had covered the old logo with a giant sticker that had the new logo on it. And I’ve seen a BK in Pittsburgh with a Old West type treatment on its sign.
McDonald’s and Wendy’s have both kept the same, or very similar, logos and signs for such a long time that I’ve personally never seen one that had something different. And I’m the only one who cares about Hardee’s, but I’ll mention it anyway: their change in the mid-nineties from Brown-and-Orange to Brown-and-Blue and then their later change to the Carl’s Jr. star logo caused much consternation on my part when the local Hardee’s in Fort Dodge, Iowa where I grew up did not stay current.
If I was going to give out an award for “Fast Food Restaurants That Time Forgot”, or Ffrttf’s (pronounced Fifferretteff’s), those three BK’s would all be nominated. But they wouldn’t win.
This Taco Bell, located on 70th and Dodge in Omaha, is the hands-down winner. And if its not a unanimous landslide, its damn close.
First of all, its located at perhaps the busiest intersection in the entire city — a metroplex of nearly 800,000 people.
Second of all, its not just one logo behind. Its three logos behind! They have not kept current for going on 15 years! Kids who are Freshmen in High School were not alive when this logo was current!
Based on memory, and some quick research (meaning if I’m wrong, please correct me, and be polite about it, won’t you?) Taco Bell has had four logos on their signs since 1985. This one falls somewhere in the late-80s to early-90s. From what I could gather from Wikipedia, they got rid of the rainbow pattern and the brown logo in 1995 in favor of the now-familiar purple-and-pink color scheme.
Meaning that this Taco Bell is AT LEAST 11 years behind the times. And probably more. Truly the Taco Bell That Time Forgot.
But that’s only half of the story.
The building was built before the popularity of drive-thru windows forced all fast food restaurants to incorporate that feature into their structures. At some point, they tacked the window booth onto the side of the building. Problem is, the lay of the lot didn’t allow the window to be on the right side of the building, like every other drive thru in America. So they put it on the left. Not a big deal, you say?
Yeah, its not until you realize you have to pay and get your food through the Passenger side window!
I took my brother to this Taco Bell last week, and he declared it “an Abomination. What the hell is this?” Far from an abomination, I think its quite awesome myself. Things that are different are cool; they add a little spice to an otherwise sameness to life. Everytime I go to this Taco Bell I get a little excited, knowing I have to roll down the passenger window and pay that way. Its like a Disney ride or something. And its especially fun if you have passengers — it makes the drive-thru experience an equal opportunity activity. I can’t say I get excited when I go a Taco Bell anywhere else. Well, I could say that, but I’d be lying.
Other design notes about The Taco Bell That Time Forgot:
-The building’s garbage dumpsters are also on the left side, so if you’re lucky enough to be in the drive-thru line when its garbage time, you get to watch employees cross the line with garbage-cans-on-wheels. If you let them through, you’ll usually get a nod or a wave or something. If you don’t, they’ll either cross in front of the car behind you, or just stand there and act awfully surly. Good times.
-The drive-thru menu is, interestingly enough, the new purple-and-pink design scheme.
-The cups, bags and wrappers are all current. I always hold out hope that I’ll get a vintage 1980s brown-and-rainbow cup. I’m always disappointed.
Ah, The Taco Bell That Time Forgot. You bet.
April 12th, 2006 at 1:43 pm
So I’m not the only one that notices these things! Thanks Tom, I’m glad that I’m not a freak (at least for this reason).
I’m really partial to the Arby’s that have really old signs, they seem much more prevalent to me. There is a particular section of Lee Highway in Northern Virginia (in the Merrifield area) that has both the old school Arby’s logo (the one with the big hat) and a Taco Bell that has the new logo, BUT is located in a building that was built somewhere in the 1960s or 1970s. That’s the most awesome one. The building doesn’t look like any fast food restaurant of the last 20+ years.
We also have a fair amount of Roy Rogers around DC (this is where they started) that have their old 70s logo and building design. Roy Rogers is sort of a mess when it comes to an over-all brand identity. Between here and New York if you were to stop at all of them, you’d get a miniature corporate history.
And there is this weird thing about McDonald’s in Northern California that have a logotype completely different than anywhere else. It’s like “hip” in a 1986 kinda way.
April 12th, 2006 at 2:33 pm
I always notice this sort of thing too. I always laugh at the places like the “Burger Queen” of Twisp Washington which try to make themselves look like a name brand, but aren’t.
April 13th, 2006 at 7:31 am
DC, I know that Arby’s and Taco Bell well! (didn’t it used to be one of the only 24-hour Taco Bells around?) My wife and I have spent much time on Route 15 going through Pennsylvania to get to my in-laws in Buffalo and passed by some real gems along the way. One town had a place called Biff Burger, which looked like it hadn’t changed since the 50′s and a Chinese restaurant called Lung Fung. There was also a bank called the Swineford National Bank. Alas, on our last trip through, Biff Burger and Lung Fung were no more.
April 13th, 2006 at 7:33 pm
I too noticed Burger Queen and found it very disturbing. I imagined that all the service people were dressed in drag making them actually burger-queens!! No, that didn’t make me stop to order.
April 13th, 2006 at 8:40 pm
I would like to first object to the idea that people living in “Podunk USA” don’t notice or don’t care about these sign changes. This is a common attitude from people who don’t live in the middle part of the U.S. If I live in a town of under 200,000 people, I must be a dumb hayseed, right? Perhaps this wasn’t your intent, but I am a little irritated at the underlying attitude some people have (perhaps subconsciously) that if you live in Oklahoma or Kansas (which I do) that you don’t have any culture. I’m not angry…I’m just saying that good and smart people don’t just live on the coasts!
With that said, what accounts for these “historic” sign sightings?
My guess is that since these stores are franchised, maybe it is up to the franchisee to purchase the signage and/or build a newer-styled building? However, if the corporate types spend all of this money on creating a new identity, it seems like they would force all of the stores to conform.
I personally think it’s kind of cool that you find some of these retro restaurants. McDonald’s actually has been building new McDonald’s locations that are styled to look like OLD locations.
http://www.rickleephoto.com/blog/mcdonalds1.jpg
Plus, how great is it when you see an old 50′s neon Dairy Queen?
http://flickr.com/photos/hyperbolation/29869661/
Perhaps you have it backwards: Maybe the Podunks just have the common sense not to throw out a great fast-food look!
April 13th, 2006 at 10:42 pm
I don’t think that’s what he meant. I’ve known Tom since before we were in kindergarten, and believe me he can be a little sloppy with his metaphors from time to time. It sounds to me like he was trying to convey that somehow the chains themselves neglect to update stores here in the midwest, for whatever reason, and so therefore when you come across one with an aged identity intact, it happens to be in a small town or a town in a smaller state. The word “Podunk” was just his lazy way of conveying that.
April 13th, 2006 at 10:56 pm
Nice to see you reading the site, A.
I was sloppy in approaching that paragraph, you’re right, and thank you for calling me on it. My point was that usually when you see a fast food joint with old signage, its off the beaten path. Not on arguably the busiest intersection in a relatively big city. Those are usually the first places to update. That’s what I really meant to convey in that sentance, and it came out wrong.
A, do you remember how the Godfather’s back home still had the 1980s Technicolor Dreamcoat Godfather’s Pizza logo on its building until like two years ago? I was sad to see that go.
I think its Awesome that this Taco Bell still has the old sign, and perhaps my favorite part of that place is if you go inside the restaurant (venturing past the wrong-way drive thru) the old spanish tile is still intact on the floor inside. Good stuff. There’s a helluva lot more charm in that place than any soulless new fast food building, that much I know.
April 14th, 2006 at 11:43 am
I love the old Arby’s signs with their western charm, the ones where the lightbulbs run around the edges. Man they are cool. It’s funny how old design takes you back in time.
An old Arby’s sign that represented the “old west cowboy mystique” but was up in the 70s, I wonder what time period that brings one back to?
April 14th, 2006 at 1:12 pm
I always enjoy picking out major fast food places that have been converted after they close. All the elements that go into creating architectural identity lead to some interesting decorating decisions when the building gets a new tenant.
With that in mind, I was really excited when I found Not Fooling Anybody, where intrepid rangers display these questionable conversions.
April 16th, 2006 at 12:40 pm
Glad to see this post, for I too pay attention to such things. I tend to notice more so the KFC store fronts that still say “Kentucky Fried Chicken”. Those always seem to suprise me a little.
April 24th, 2006 at 4:58 pm
Thought I’d share some History on the Designer and Identity Consultancy of the Taco Bell, That Time Forgot.
That Old Taco Bell Identity was Designed by Soyster & Ohrenschall, a Legendary
San Francisco Identity Consultancy. Renamed Addison.
The Designer of the Taco Bell Identity System is Legendary Identity Designer/Consultant Howard York.
Responsible for Creative Direction OF Exxon; ESSO Petrol Stations Worldwide; with Saul Bass. To include; BP; SOHIO; GULF; Japan Energy Corporation; (JOMO). Howard York Commenced Exterior Retail Signage for McDonald’s during
his tenure with Bass Yager Associates.
Other Major Identity Contributions of Howard York’s Genius, SANYO; Conroy’s Flowers, (others)
With Anspach Grossman Portugal.
With Addison, Responsible for Creative Direction, Development and Design of National Jewish Hospital; Hill Bros Imported Coffee Exchange; General Sekiyu (GSK) Petrol Stations; Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza; Embassy Suites; Nebraska Savings; Norwest Bank;(others).
With Lippincott & Margulies, Howard York Developed and Designed Identities for American Motors; Weyerhaeuser; TransUnion; Household International, Girard Bank, Goldman Sachs Brokerage, (other).
Also to Mr. York’s Credit is the Identities for AARP; Riyahd International Airport; Pace Foods, National Elevator and The Arts Commission of San Francisco, only Sratches The Surface.
Corporate Identity 101, Guys and Dolls.
Generally when a new Corporate Identity System is Implemented. It is the Corporate Owned Facilities that Benefit from the Revitalization Initially.
Franchise Retail Outlets are allowed to Implement Revitalization at their Discretion or Lack thereof.
Thus, the Problem that Exist with Burger King and other Fast Food Restaurants that have not Brought Image In line with Reality. More than likely they’re Franchise Outlets.
DC1974 and Gregory Borden.
If I’m not having a Senior Moment and My Recall Functioning Properly. I think Lippincott & Margulies Developed and Designed the Arby’s Identity. Although, a Vegetarian for over twenty years. A friend and I were in a Shopping Mall. I was quite surprised to see the Arby’s Identity hard at work and unchanged and continuing to operate since the early 1960s.
A Milestone for a Staple Fast Food Chain that no longer Advertises in Mainstream Media. At least in the Washington Metro Area. It’s been Light Years since I’ve seen an Arby’s Television Commercial.
Back To My Sabbatical.
DM
April 26th, 2006 at 2:15 pm
I am interest in the old style Taco Bell buildings with the parapet w/bell space. Anyone know if any of these have fallen over/failed? Or, have any of these parapets been removed because of cracks, etc? Thanks
May 4th, 2006 at 11:27 am
The greatest thing about the older Taco Bell’s and Burger Kings, etc. is you know exactly what they are! Some of the new designs are becoming so confusing in their identity – combined Taco Bells and Baskin Robbins… combined Wendy’s and Tim Horton’s… its a feeding frenzy!!
August 19th, 2006 at 9:26 am
The great Omaha trademark of the reverse drive-thru Taco Bell is no more. A giant empty lot with a “we’re remodeling” sign has replaced it. May the new building also be as historic as the old one was.
August 19th, 2006 at 10:14 pm
Donovan, your alerting me to this development has greatly soured my mood!
I just ate there recently too.
Taco Bell, when you demolish and bulldoze the old structure to replace it with a new one it is called “rebuilding” not “remodeling”. English 101, guys.
When historical structures like this cease to be, Omaha loses! No, America loses!
However will I sleep tonight? Sadness envelopes my soul.
Back to my sabbatical.
TN
August 20th, 2006 at 11:16 pm
Ask Bennett if he’s ever eaten at this taco bell in Glendive, Montana…
The have the best potatoe ole’s, but I think they all do.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/goatopolis/40132120/
August 31st, 2007 at 2:40 am
I do remember two original Taco Bells, in Erie. They, since, been replaced with the building that is in the middle picture. I’ve heard form sources that the first two Taco Bells (In Erie) were built in the late 70′s-early 80′s.
As for Arby’s, we do have two of these original neon signs in Erie, although the buildings have been remoldled a long while ago. These signs are still in operation. The Arby’s sign has to be one of my favorite neon signs.
February 17th, 2008 at 2:51 pm
I am a British designer who had the good fortune to work at Soyster & Ohrenschall in about 1984 on a two month placement from the company’s London owner. It was incredible – they’d been responsible for so much great corporate identity work, from Konica films to Holiday Inn. I was blown away by them and fell in love with San Francisco at the same time.
Every time I get to SF I make a visit to Sutter Street just to relive my time there. Legendary – yes they were. I was never the same again.
June 20th, 2008 at 7:44 am
Sad to say that time finally remembered this Taco Bell. It now looks like every other modern store, complete with driver-side drive-through.
Still, thanks for the memories. I thought of a few of my own after I stumbled across this page!
August 15th, 2008 at 11:49 pm
I live in a suburb of Detroit, and there is a Rally’s (in Eastpointe) who has 2 drive thru windows on either side of the building, so you can choose if you want to use the passenger side window or not. I guess the theory is that if you have a passenger in the car this line would be quicker since most people would use the typical driver-side window.
Also, this has probably the slowest and overall worst service of any place of business I’ve ever been to.