ArdraF
Well-known member
- Joined
- Feb 12, 2006
- Posts
- 10,695
The November 2013 issue of Motorhome magazine (pp. 18-21) has an interesting article about the man who is responsible for collecting items for Cracker Barrel restaurants. Larry Singleton's mother owned an antique store and Dan Evins, the man who founded and built the first Cracker Barrel, asked her to find items of Americana for what he envisioned as a country-store feeling. She was so successful that she found Americana artifacts for every store thereafter. As Larry got older he joined his parents in searching the country for their collection and he eventually took over the now permanent job. Kathleen and Don Singleton and their son Larry have located the decor items for all 624 Cracker Barrel locations in 42 states and every store has more than 1,000 items without any duplicates or copies. What I found interesting was that he may find an item in Texas that is unique to Maine and he tries to return such items to their original locale. He now has a warehouse with 100,000 antiques that he can use in each new Cracker Barrel that opens.
I don't know about you, but Jerry and I have often commented while eating in a Cracker Barrel that it must be quite a job to find all the unusual items on the walls. We always enjoy trying to figure out how some of them were used. So the next time you're in a Cracker Barrel and looking around at all the fun things from your childhood (or your parents!) you can thank the Singleton family for their efforts.
ArdraF
I don't know about you, but Jerry and I have often commented while eating in a Cracker Barrel that it must be quite a job to find all the unusual items on the walls. We always enjoy trying to figure out how some of them were used. So the next time you're in a Cracker Barrel and looking around at all the fun things from your childhood (or your parents!) you can thank the Singleton family for their efforts.
ArdraF
