AFAICT, the closest Waffle House to be is just short of 1000 miles from here in Colorado. As far as chain diners go, we’ve got Denny’s and Shari’s (I.e. Denny’s for old people), and Denny’s is the only sit-down place that stays open all night aside from the McDonald’s at the truck stop.
Near Kittanning. But I know New Castle lol.
I have a few gas stations fairly close by that are open 24 hours but I think that’s about it. I’m not going to count the Waffle House or the 24/7 McDonald’s as stores though. The Walmart and Kroger nearby used to be 24/7 pre-COVID I think, but now they close at 10:00 PM. When I moved from Dallas to Pine Bluff, Arkansas it was a real culture shock because everything closed around 8:00-9:00 PM. If I wanted to go do my grocery store shopping at 10:00 PM I was just out of luck.
Nothing near me. There may be stuff in the nearest city that’s open all night, I’m not sure.
And there are definitely still staffing shortages (and higher wages for low-end jobs) near me, lots of people quit during covid and discovered they could do something better with their time than work for minimum wages.
May I ask the general area of where this is?
I am an American, formerly living in the States, now living in Europe for the last seven years, specifically Luxembourg.
24-hour shops are simply not a thing here. It’s totally alien to anyone’s expectations that you should be able to go to a grocery store or large department store at any time. The groceries all close at 7pm or 8pm and re-open at either 7am or 8am depending on the day of the week. Non-grocery retailers close at 7pm and re-open at either 9am or 10am.
Also, on Sunday, nearly everything is entirely closed all day. Some standalone groceries are open 7am to 1pm, but everything else is shut.
There are a few exceptions. Convenience stores attached to petrol stations, as mentioned by others, are frequently open 24 hours (but not always). And unlike the US, these shops are stocked with food of a lot better quality than the typical American kwik-e-mart. It’s not just beer and magazines and packaged snacks and automotive fluids. You can get milk, fresh fruit, and a limited stock of ingredients at the Total shop five minutes from me. Also, I’ve never seen a bakery that’s closed on Sunday morning; they’re all 7-day operations because Europeans gotta have their fresh bread.
So if it’s Sunday at 3pm and I discover my wife ate for lunch the fresh vegetables I was planning to serve alongside dinner, I’m out of luck until the next day, I gotta do something different.
This isn’t just because we’re in the rural part of Luxembourg, either. It holds true if you go into Luxembourg City, or cross the border to the biggest nearby cities in France, Belgium, and Germany. There’s no 24-hour retail, and everything’s shut on Sunday.
Partly, this is a cultural difference. Back in the days of religious lawmaking, Sunday was a day of rest, and that was not just expected but enforced. (There are laws here against mowing your lawn on a Sunday, too.) Then the rise of labor as a powerful political influence happened, so even as religion was fading as a center of authority, workers’ councils forced the rest expectations to be cemented as labor rights instead of as respect for the Church. There are extremely strict laws in Luxembourg about how many hours a business can be open, and what kinds of businesses are allowed to operate on Sunday and for how long, so even if market forces might theoretically push for, say, Sunday evening shopping, it’s not legal. (Though there are a handful of holiday exceptions here, as well.)
It was definitely an adjustment, but you get used to it. You just have to plan and organize better. No more living impulsively. That’s not entirely a bad thing.
A lot of places in Albuquerque that used to be open 24/7 have pulled back since the pandemic, but there are 4 all-night convenience stores, a McDonald’s, and a Whataburger within walking distance. You have to go a little farther for a sit-down restaurant, and I think almost all of those are chains. There’s one Walgreens that stays open all night, although the pharmacy closes at 1:30 a.m. There used to be two 24-hour Walmarts and one 24-hour Target within an easy drive, but the last one of those started closing at 10 after the last shooting in their parking lot. Even the Dunkin Donuts by the freeway closes at midnight now.
So you won’t go hungry or have to go without basic groceries or toiletries here. Funny thing, though: I just realized I haven’t looked for a 24-hour establishment for years!
There’s a Waffle House in Texarkana. Good distance to go from me for a crappy waffle. Not that I would frequent the place. It looks pretty old, and disgusting.
There are lots of stuff open 24/6, there. Yeah, closed over Sunday night. I guess for cleaning, restocking or something.
All liquor stores close on Sunday. I think sports bars and private clubs are open on Sunday afternoons.
I have never heard of a actual pharmacy being open 24 hours. Would a pharmacist be on Staff?
New Mexico law says:
Every licensed pharmacy will be under continued daily supervision of a registered pharmacist who shall have direct control of the pharmaceutical affairs of the pharmacy.
That means the Walgreens must have a pharmacist there until 1:30 a.m, and they have to close the actual pharmacy off when they leave.
In the Nashville suburb of Bellevue (pop. 75k or so), our 24 hour stores are:
- All of the convenience stores/gas stations except Kroger’s
- Planet Fitness
- Waffle House
- McDonald’s according to Google Maps, although they look dark every time I return from work just before midnight M-F
Laundromats close at 12a, Walgreens at 11p (was 24/7 until last month), Kroger at 10p (was 24/7 until Covid).
Well let’s see, the 24-hour stores within one block from my apartment include a supermarket, convenience store, McDonalds, a pizza place, a deli and bodega and probably others I forget. This is in Manhattan so 24-hour stores are expected.
A new grocery store that sprung up near here was initially open 24 hours. Then COVID hit, and they never went back to a 24/7 schedule. I think they close at 9. The only things around here open 24/7 are virtually all gas stations (though the convenience store part might not be) and, oddly enough, McDonald’s. This is the McD’s that I mentioned before as being perpetually busy at almost any time of day. Whoever owns that franchise has got himself a gold mine.
all the 24/7 stores here mostly stopped before COVID-19 even happened due to crime … Walmart had a homeless band that was living in the store for like 2 years until they were finally caught …after that its 11 pm …
although some of the grocery stores that were 24 hours stayed open until 2 am
The gas stations close up the main store but have a drive-thru type of walk-up window for late nights …
We have one 24 hour CVS
After reading more I realize our Planet Fitness and Sheetz are 24 hours.
I hadn’t considered including fitness clubs in the “store” concept, but since you mentioned it, there is one of these places about ten minutes from us that promotes itself as being open and available 24/7 (or, in the local construction, 7j/7). Seems odd that this would be one of the few exceptions, but there it is.
I was gobsmacked a few months ago to learn that Portland (and the greater Portland metropolitan area) has ZERO 24-hour pharmacies.
We have convenience stores such as 7-Eleven and Plaid Pantry, a few all-night gas stations, Denny’s, ihop, the Shari’s near the airport, and some McDonalds drive-thrus. Interestingly, although Winco Foods bills itself as a 24-hour supermarket, none of the three in Portland proper stay open past midnight (the Clackamas one does, though, in case I want to stock up on produce at four in the morning).
There’s a few 24 hour pharmacies, a few 24 hour McDonalds (on the edge of the city, so easy access for travellers). I wouldn’t the be surprised if some of the gas stations on the highway bypasses were 24 hours, but I’ve not noticed any in the city proper.
Strange. Other than a very few full-service stations (not sure there are any left at all) I’ve actually never seen a closed gas station around here. To me a “closed gas station” conjures an image in a movie of a gas station in the middle of nowhere, all the lights out, its metal Texaco sign squeaking in the wind as a tumbleweed rolls by (and the background music swells to indicate that a zombie is about to appear out of the darkness!).
But I’m not usually driving around in the middle of the night so I could be mistaken, but I’ve occasionally had to drive my son to or from the airport at very odd hours, and I’ve never seen a gas station closed. In fact it’s one of the few businesses that’s reliably open even on Christmas Day.
Within a two mile radius of me it’s just the one 7-Eleven with a gas station.
Expanding it out to five miles adds a Cumberland Farms (local gas/convenience chain) and a CVS.
There are seven gas stations in that circle that are closed right now (6:34am on Sunday) and another three that opened at 5am or 6am. Some would be open earlier on a weekday.
Context: Affluent suburban Boston area.
ETA: There’s technically a highway service area open 24/7/365 within a five mile radius, but I couldn’t get there without driving more than ten miles. They have several fast food places a mini-mart and of course gas.
In Switzerland there are bakeries that are even closed on Sundays. And those that are open tend to close at noon, or even 11:00 am.
In the last 15 years there are more shops at the major train stations, and the shops are open about the same time that the train stations are. This means it’s possible to buy groceries even on Sundays until 10:00 at night.
But train stations are not open 24-7. Even the main train station in Zurich closes at night.
At the nearest rest stop, it’s possible to buy fuel 24 hours, using a credit card or debit. That’s it. The convenience store closes at 10:00 pm or midnight. There’s probably a vending machine as well, but that won’t have much to offer.
In my town, there are two vending machines at the train station. That’s our only option if we wanted something different to eat. And it’s typical vending machine fare.
Recently a company set up an autonomous shop near the middle of Luzern. After being open for about 3 months, somebody got their nose out of joint and had them shut down. It’s considered an unfair advantage that the shop can be open 24-7.
On Friday and Saturday nights there are a few clubs which are open until 5 am, along with a few places to get food. Those places then close, so there’s nothing open between 5 am and 8 am, approximately.
This has nothing to do with COVID. Family time is sacred.