Saturday, July 14, 2007

New Local Tourist Attraction

My wife's desire to bake led me to the 7-11 on Kenilworth Avenue in Bladensburg recently. I had heard about the promotional change to make this location look like a Kwik-E-Mart from the Simpsons. When I got there it seemed to be working well for the 7-11 atleast.

My first sight when I drove into the parking lot was somebody who was probably a local, taking a picture of a father and son sporting the uniform of the tourist, "I love DC" T-shirts. They made sure they were smiling as they cozied up to Marge and her bag of groceries. Now maybe they were in the area for other reasons, but it seemed to me like they had made a detour from the usual DC attractions to see the Kwik-E-Mart. It was funny to me that an ordinary 7-11 in a not very touristy part of the the DC area was drawing in people just to see the sight.

Inside there was a busier than normal line. While there appeared to be the local blue collar workers picking up coffee, doughnuts, and the other essentials for the work day, there were also several people who only had the promotional items such as Buzz Cola or Krusty-O's. It seems the draw of the Kwik-E-Mart is great. I would have taken pictures of the store to share, but I wouldn't want to look like a tourist or a crazy Simpson's fanatic.

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