Virginia based Clumpps Gas – known for the wide variety of amenities it provides – will open its 747th US location in DesMoines next month.
“We have stores in 36 other states,” says Clumpps CEO Monica Ralston. “It’s wonderful we’re finally able to get into the great state of Iowa.” DeMoines was the popular chain’s fifth attempt, following residents voting against them in Dubuque, Davenport, Mason City, and Ames. “Residents in those towns were concerned about all the crowds and excitement,” says Ralston. “The people of DesMoines saw the potential.”
Clumpps offers customers hundreds of attractions, including:
- 117 varieties of coffees, mochas, and teas
- Johnson’s French Pastiche Crullers, available nowhere else in the United States.
- Five minute pottery lessons
- A children’s petting zoo featuring a variety of nearly extinct animals, – the bornean orangutan, the midget otter, the black-footed ferret, and 43 others.
- A number of prostitution services
The latter is possible, according to Ralston, by a little known federal law that overrides state regulations in any business also offering podiatry and optometry services, which Clummps does.
And while most national gas chains average 16 pumps, all Clumpps stations start out with 64, and usually grow.
“One, we’re giving people what they want,” says Ralston, “and two, never underestimate the value of good foot and eye doctors.”
