“I think it would have been acceptable to ride my horse right in and wear a cowboy hat,” said senior Aleigh Ascherl after checking out Orange City’s Pizza Ranch at its new location. The restaurant is now located on the east side of town right off Highway 10. The Ranch has spiced up its location, design and even upped the quality of service by making use of the more modernized restaurant.
General Manager, Brad Cleveringa said, “We have really stepped it up, not just in our location, but our service has gone up. Our crew comes in with pride.”
The Pizza Ranch, Inc., was founded in 1981 and now has over 140 locations. It has franchises in nine states and the headquarters are currently located in Orange City. Having the restaurant in the same town as the corporate office provides a great opportunity for this prototype restaurant.
From now on, whenever a new Pizza Ranch is opened, it will have the same style and design as the Orange City location. It will also give other franchises a chance to observe how their new facility will operate. The modernized facility is also beneficial because the Orange City Ranch acts as a manager-training store.
Plans for the new facility have been in the making for quite some time. The property lot was bought in the fall of 2008. And because the Pizza Ranch in Orange City has been located downtown for 26 years, the management thought it was time for a change.
The original store needed fixing; it was just a matter of deciding to put money into remodeling or rebuilding from the ground up. The new location and facility have thus far proven to be nothing but pleasing.
“Some of the benefits and advantages include better parking, being located in between Alton and Orange City and being along the main highway,” said Cleveringa in regards to the new location. “We couldn’t have spread out and done this layout downtown.”
There is some concern about the amount of seating in the new facility because it no longer has a basement, which cuts out 60 seats.
Cleveringa doesn’t seem too worried about this issue. “The seating isn’t negative; it’s more efficient. It’s fortunate to have it all on one level to manage.”
The Ranch has many new features. The community/party room includes a flat screen television that can be used for leisure watching or presentations. There are now separate pizza and chicken buffets, along with a salad bar and a dessert bar.
A to-go window has also been added and Wi-Fi Internet is coming soon. Above all these features, the biggest crowd pleaser seems to be the soft serve ice cream machine.
“People love it! It goes great on dessert pizza, and it’s a great finishing touch, said Cloveringa. “College students have been wowed and are enjoying the ice cream.”