The Wendy’s on 33rd Avenue SW in Cedar Rapids, next to I-380, has closed permanently. Signage had been completely removed as of Sunday, and the location on the corporate website gets a 404 error. There are still four other locations in Cedar Rapids, including one of two fast-food options near downtown, so the city still has Iowa’s largest presence for that fast-food chain. The question is if the new McDonald’s at Center Point Road and 32nd Street NW will take sales from the Wendy’s at Center Point Road and 42nd Street NW. (Fun fact: Decades ago the lot at the northeast corner of the latter intersection had a rural brick schoolhouse that was annexed into Cedar Rapids as the city and school grew.)
The Wendy’s on University Avenue in Cedar Falls near College Square closed earlier this year, as did the location on the south side of Marshalltown, leaving both those cities without any. There are only three exceptions statewide to a location list of smallish cities and up: “Percival”, which is really the Wendy’s in the Middle of Nowhere at I-29 and IA 2 in the southwest corner; a relatively new location on I-80 at the Avoca exit, which once housed a Maid-Rite; and on the other side of I-80 from the World’s Largest Truck Stop in Walcott.
The depressing sameness of fast-food interiors from about the past 15 years probably has not helped with image, nor has the massive increase in the cost of everything that’s squeezing franchisees. The “4 for $4” deal has been absent for years now, although the $5 “Biggie Bag” option that allows the choice of two items (only one of which may be a burger, the menu explicitly says) works out well enough.
IMO, the first step in a turnaround for the chain would be extricating itself from those absurd Coca-Cola Freestyle pop dispensers. They’re bad. No one likes them. That goes for you too, Burger King.