Wichita Falls Winco Foods Grand Opening Surprise

For many months now, it seems, I have been looking forward to the opening of Winco Foods.

I learned to like Winco whilst living in the Dallas/Fort Worth zone. And on my many visits to Arizona. 

Winco makes my all-time favorite bagels. Among many other things I like.

Such as Winco's huge bulk foods section.

And Winco's grind it yourself peanut butter.

I knew Winco would have a huge impact on the Wichita Falls grocery store scene, due to prior to Winco, it has seemed to me, Wichita Falls has been ill served in the grocery store department.

So, I headed to today's Winco Grand Opening about a half hour after the official Grand Opening time of 9 this Monday morning of October 13.

I figured there would not be many people at the Winco Grand Opening, due to it seemed to me to be unlikely many locals knew anything about Winco. That and the awkward way one currently gets to Winco's parking lot, a one-way freeway frontage road, awaiting the completion of a second connecting road to the Winco parking lot.

As soon as I got on the frontage road I saw traffic was backed up, turning on to the road that connects to the Winco parking lot.

A solid line of vehicles.

Soon I realized the solid line of vehicles was looking for a place to park, with the line leaving was giving up on that search.

The photo I took at the top, as I slowly drove along, does little justice to the actual congestion level.

Eventually an even more surprising scene came into view.

That surprising scene was a long line of people queuing up to wait their turn to enter Winco. Was this a natural backup, due to the store being solidly packed? Or was there someone controlling entry to the store? 

 And here you see how long the line was of people waiting their turn to enter Winco.

Free samples, while they lasted, were mentioned in the Winco ad which arrived in my mailbox a few days ago.

If one did get inside the store I am assuming there would be long lines to sample anything free. Or to grind some peanuts. Or bag some bagels.

And, imagine the long wait to get to a checker or a self checkout station.

So, I opted to limit my today Winco Grand Opening experience to being a drive-by experience. 

Bagels and peanut butter can wait for another day...