I Really Want a Big Barney

 

Those of you new to Northeast Ohio, new being a relative term as I actually mean pre early 1980s, probably wonder why now and again you pass a Furnace Repair Company, Real Estate Office or Gyro Shop that looks all the world like a Barn built on a major road for no real apparent reason.

Well, because once upon a time in certain parts of the world a place called The Red Barn not only competed with McDonalds and Burger King but pretty much beat um in my mind. I know when I was a kid going out for fast food meant The Red Barn, and when I was a teenager when my friends and I wanted to hang out somewhere we hung out at the Local Red Barn just a couple block walk from our Stow, Ohio neighborhood. There were quite a few of the places in Northeast Ohio as the company was formed in Dayton, Ohio area and had it's corporate headquarters there in the early years of the chain's existence.

All the buildings that look like barns are from those early days of the restaurant. The barn design was patented in 1962 by the company that granted the franchise licenses, later though they went a little more traditional to keep from running afoul of local building codes.

At it's peak The Red Barn had 400 restaurants in 19 states, Ontario, Canada and Australia. It was a big deal. And it could have stayed a big deal except when Motel 6 bought Servomation, The Red Barn's parent company, in the late 1970s they were only interested in Servomation lucrative vending machine business and not the chain of largely franchise owned fast food joints kind of across the English speaking world.

So advertising stopped and they didn't even bother to renew franchise leases, and the Red Barn was gone by 1986. Too bad, I loved that place as a kid.

A number of the franchise owners tried to make a go of it more or less alone by calling themselves The Farm and using the same menu. In fact almost 30 years after the fact there are still two left, one in Racine, Wisconsin and another in Bradford, Pennsylvania.

The Big Barney, my personal favorite if memory serves, was probably akin to the best Bic Mac you've ever had. And it was out years before the Big Mac. The Barnbuster was closer to the Quarter Pounder I guess, but also much better. Lots of Fried Chicken, which I always remember my folks getting. And my Dad was serious about his Fried Chicken.

I'm pretty sure the first Salad Bar I ever saw was at Red Barn. And while I had no idea what it meant at the time I knew their claim the Chicken and Fish were cooked in pure vegetable oil was a good thing.

As a really little kid I love the place because of all the give aways. Coloring books, crayons, iron-ons, free glasses, and I have memories of having a cut out farm my little sister and I played with. And Hamburger Hungry, Fried Chicken Hungry and Big Fish Hungry were so much cooler than Ronald McDonald.

I still have the memories of course, and a Red Barn ash tray I picked up at a Goodwill or something other store years ago. Unless of course I head over to Bradford, Pennsylvania sometime soon. It's only a three hour drive, which isn't far at all if a Big Barney is as good as I remember,