Sheetz strikes me as a grind joint of sorts. They seem to run real high volumes, run an efficient operation, and look, how should I put it, less than perfect (both inside and outside). While their facilities (pumps, drink equipment, kiosks, etc.) all seem to be in working order, cosmetic appearances do not seem to be a high priority for them not only day to day but also things like sign appearance, etc. They are sure efficient on the food preparation and checkout side though. To that regard on efficiency, they remind me of Quik Trip.Brian Lutz wrote: ↑June 16th, 2023, 6:12 pm I haven't been to more than a couple of locations yet, but Sheetz is the dominant C-store chain around here and I haven't been impressed with their restrooms either. The QuikTrip locations down near Charlotte (and other QTs I've been to in other states) seem much nicer overall. The restrooms at Maverik are generally decent in newer stores, but there seems to be reports of those not being maintained particularly well over time.
Out of the truck stop chains it seems to me that Love's has the most consistently clean restrooms, while Pilot/Flying Js are generally OK but can be hit-or-miss. Newer TAs are generally OK too, but they have a tendency to get behind on maintenance.
Maverik did 10 year remodels to the stores they built 10 years ago where they liquidated all of the inventory and basically replaced everything inside the stores, including a complete re-do of the restrooms. This was done to EVERY location in my area (not just some), they spent over a year doing it. We will see if they maintain things better this time around but so far in my area we are on year 2 of these remodels they did around town they seem to be maintaining them better.
TA has been in survival mode for a lot of years, they've done better the past 5ish years and finally started to be able to invest in their stops again and have addressed various deferred maintenance issues. TA is now owned by BP so we will see how that plays out. I expect improvements but BP also owns Thornton's and so far Thornton's is still a dirty dive of a chain.
I've found the truck stops to be really dependent on how busy they are and how many maintenance staff they have on duty. These major stops all have dedicated maintenance staff to handle various tasks and restrooms are one of their tasks. I've stopped at major chain truck stop showers, probably Pilot, and while I was very apprehensive about it the first time I used one, I was pleasantly surprised with the cleanliness enough that when the need arose another time elsewhere I was okay with the idea, so I have now used those twice, and if the need arose again, as long as the stop/restrooms appeared clean, I'd be okay with the idea. The one thing you'll generally notice with the truck stop chains is the restrooms do not appear to suffer from long term neglect (accumulated build ups in corners, falling apart toilet seats, loose sinks, etc.), this is in part due to the maintenance staff who is in house and will actually address these issues quickly as they arise. That maintenance staff has quite a bit of stuff to maintain and truck stops are generally pretty roughly worn locations.