980 University Drive East

Grub's space went through several incarnations, and may yet continue to do so (from The Eagle, 4/27/08)
We've covered the restaurants around the fountain (except for Blue Baker/Atami, which are still their charter tenants from almost twenty years ago)—Abuelo's Mexican Food Embassy (now Casa Mangiare), the building that once held Veritas Wine & Bistro, Ben & Jerry's, and It's a Grind (and their successor restaurants), and what was, until recently, Razzoo's Cajun Cafe...plus, the stand-alone restaurant east of it, the old TGI Friday's. Beyond that is 980 University Drive East.

It featured four spaces, with 980A (instead of 100), suite 200, suite 300, and suite 400, and as of 2025 there are two vacant spaces, though most of them have operated in the last twenty years. The first space was originally home to Pei Wei Asian Diner, a fast-casual concept owned by P.F. Chang's China Bistro, operating from late 2005 to August 2019 (Pei Wei closed a bunch of restaurants during this time, likely stemming from being spun off from P.F. Chang's). In late 2021, The Cookshack, a restaurant serving Nashville hot chicken, opened, but it too closed as of November 2025 (seems the whole chain imploded, at least partially). Suite 200 has SportClips (the first local location) since around 2005, nothing dramatic there, suite 300 had Jamba Juice, which closed in November 2023 (I don't think it ever got the new "Jamba" branding).¹ It is still vacant to my knowledge. Suite 400 opened in 2007 (maybe early 2008) as Eccell Steakhouse, a new concept by Eccell Group, before it closed in 2010 and became Bodega Coast, a seafood restaurant, trading in the Cafe Eccell-inspired menu for the nearby La Bodega, and that lasted six months before another concept, Knockouts Grill House (I think it was a sports bar) came. By January 2012 it was closed and a few months later, Grub Burger Bar opened. Grub Burger Bar was a relatively successful concept and opened a number of locations all the way to the East Coast, and by the time it was acquired by Hopdoddy in 2018, had 18 locations (several had closed in 2020). Grub doesn't exist as a chain anymore...Hopdoddy rebranded them and probably would've done the same here as it already had a location at Century Square about a mile or so to the west.

What does the future hold for this site? Prognosis isn't looking good, it's 20+ years old, half-vacant, and Hopdoddy is probably letting Grub Burger Bar run down its lease². This may end up being the first true redeveloped building on the strip, even if many of the restaurants in the center are second-generation.

1. Jamba Juice wasn't new to the area, not exactly. In 1999, they purchased the Zuka Juice chain, which had two locations, one of them being an Exxon at Welsh and FM 2818, the other near Best Buy and Office Depot, but these closed in 2001.
2. The other possibility is that it's Century Square they don't want to renew on, and will close down Grub for a new Hopdoddy location. Either way, Grub's future is looking dim. labels: Jamba Juice, 2000s, restaurants,barber,FM 60,Costa Dallis,College Station,endangered

Ken Martin's Steak House, Original Edition

Of course, this restaurant didn't actually start out as Ken Martin's... (source)
The [Ken Martin] label now covers almost every single restaurant M&W Restaurants was involved in that had a College Station/Bryan address (except for Pepe's Mexican Food, which is still open).

Our look at 1803 S. Texas Avenue begins around 1964 when it opened as a location of The Chicken Shack (Leslie's Chicken Shack) originally and at one time, you could access the restaurant next door with the parking lot. In 1971 it closed and became "The Steak House" later that year, owned by Ken Martin and Joe Ruiz (see article). By 1974 it was advertised as being "Ken Martin's The Steak House" and then, Ken Martin's Steak House. The first incarnation of Ken Martin's had what I've heard was the "cave room" (a dark dining room area) but don't have any pictures of it.

In 1985, the restaurant relocated to the former Pacific Coast Highway at 3231 East 29th Street where it would remain for almost the next thirty years.

In 1992-1993 it would briefly serve as one-off Sparkey's Pizza before Allred Motor Company in 1996, which gave way to Eastep Auto Sales in the late 2000s, which abandoned the location in the mid-2010s to move across the street. Finally, there's this Loopnet with some great aerials. I've got them all backed up for posterity.

From Loopnet. I don't want to see this showing up on Facebook.

A North Bryan Family Legacy

The former J.J.'s Liquor as it appeared in January 2026. (Picture by author).
Sometime relatively recently, I had a very brief conversation with Ms. Ferreri, whose late father, Joe, built a number of restaurants and a few hotels in the area.¹ But among those, Sugar 'N Spice, the other drive-in, was missing from my site, so like Wendy's and H-E-B Pantry, lets go for covering a complete set. From what I can put together, 1215 N. Texas Avenue was the original address of the location and aerials back this up.

It was in 1951 that the drive-in opened (as a North Bryan counterpart to the Triangle) by 1968 was under new management as Ferreri moved on with bigger projects (the hotels). By fall of 1970 it was closed permanently but Luke Court was to reopen the store as "Sugar N Spice Drive In Grocery", now at 1219 N. Texas Avenue, likely reusing signage.

A second location of this "new" Sugar & Spice soon opened at 601 W. 28th Avenue as well, and by 1972 two more locations were in planning or operation, 1402 W. 25th Street and 300 W. 19th Street.² In 1974, Court sold these to Southland Corporation, which first had advertised as 7-Eleven in spring of that year (with a few locations of its own also being built), and by August was holding grand openings for what would be eight locations.³ Apparently, 7-Eleven did add gas to this location, but its time as a 7-Eleven was short-lived. By 1978, it was sold and reopened as J.J.'s Filling Station, owned by J.J. Ruffino (the son of whom I have also briefly spoken to), which by 1981 would ditch the gasoline and become J.J.'s Liquor, which it would remain for almost the next thirty years.

This garage door faces Texas Avenue. (Picture by author, 1/2026)
As I previously mentioned in another post, Spec's bought the three JJ's Liquor stores in 2010. The one on Texas Avenue in College Station was their wholesale warehouse for a while, while Rock Prairie Crossing and this one continued to operate. But within a few years of that, the JJ's at Rock Prairie doubled in size when it rebranded, and this location simply closed up shop (around that time the H-E-B was rolling out its full size store, and it's a mystery why Spec's couldn't have replaced its store with something there, or expand the Bryan store).

While part of the lot was redeveloped as a self-service car wash at some point that continues to be in operation at 1217 N. Texas Avenue, the building, which had served under Ruffino, Ferreri, and 7-Eleven, was abandoned.⁴

1. Most notably Ramada Inn, Ferreri's Italian Cuisine, and Triangle Drive-In. This post should finish them.
2. The addresses, 1402 W. William Joel Bryan Parkway and 300 W. Martin Luther King Jr. Street respectively, are no more. The latter was demolished in the late 2000s while the former disappeared between 1995 and 2003. 601 W. 28th Avenue is still in operation as a convenience store, but not a branded one.
3. The local 7-Eleven stores were sold to E-Z Mart in 1993 after Southland's 1990 bankruptcy. By that time, none of the Luke Court-era stores were in business as 7-Eleven.
4. Abandoned on paper, maybe. There was a truck parked outside the building when I was taking photos and I could music coming from inside (which was crammed with boxes and other junk), so I'm hoping it was just security of some sort...but I wasn't about to find out! It's why I don't have too many pictures of the property.

Editor's Note: I've been trying to make a post for days that weren't previously made but this has created a problem of tightly packing too many in at one time, or outright missing deadlines. As a result, the updates of this blog will be uneven. There are about five or six posts that I've been meaning to re-do that I'll be working on, as well as upgrading stuff relating to Post Oak Mall. Join me at Numbered Exits in the meantime.

The Shipley's That Sold Hamburgers

The little "Entrance" sign doesn't light up anymore. When did it ever? When was it installed? (Picture by author, 1/2026)
Picking up immediately after The Now-Defunct Dairy Queen on Highway 21 is another Bryan restaurant that deserves to be covered, 3310 South College Avenue. The first reference I can find for 3310 South College Avenue (subject of today's post) is in 1970 with Shipley Do-Nut Shop, a significant departure from the modern Shipley's in that it had a more complete menu including hamburgers ("Flame Burgers") and milkshakes. This did not seem to be a corporate decision out of Shipley's Houston headquarters (none of the Houston locations seemed to do this, even in that time) and more of a liberty taken by the franchisee¹; continuing to do this even as of 1981. In 1982 Shipley moved out to its current location at Villa Maria and Cavitt and dropped the hamburgers from the menu, with the College Station location opening in 1984.

After sitting vacant for nearly a decade it reopened as Archie's South College Grille. Teaming up with E.C. Archambault of Archie's Hamburgers and Archie's Taco Bell, the restaurants operated as essentially a dual-branded operation...with two restaurants and dining rooms. For whatever reason it did not work out in that form. In fall 1992 this was retooled as The Country Diner (without Archambault) but that too closed within a few years. In August 1994 Wok Express, a Chinese buffet, opened (closed in late 1995). Golden Dragon replaced it in early 1996 but didn't make it more than three months. Bruegger's Spuds opened in 1998 but also failed within a matter of months. Burger House, however, opened in fall 2000 and became far more successful, lasting 25 years and counting, more than any other establishment in the spot combined.

1. As I understand it, this wasn't uncommon for product-based franchisees back in the day. Kentucky Fried Chicken was notably a menu item originally, not a full restaurant, with a lot of variations and options for Orange Julius, too.