Even if you’ve never stopped at The Original Pronto Pup, you’d probably recognize the place. After all, it’s hard to miss the 30-foot fiberglass corn dog that sits atop the building.
But now, after five years in operation, the eye-catching corn dog restaurant is up for sale, offered to potential buyers on Craigslist and Facebook on Sunday.
Owner Anthony McNamer, a Portland-based lawyer, opened The Original Pronto Pup in 2016 as a way to celebrate Rockaway Beach’s claim to fame as the home of the first corn dog. It’s a contested claim, but the Oregon coast town has a great case – one that McNamer is happy to promote.
“The Pronto Pup was the original corn dog,” he said. “It was weird to me that in Rockaway there wasn’t a giant corn dog statue or something.”
When he opened his restaurant, he decided to build the statue himself.
The giant fiberglass corn dog on top of the restaurant is in all likelihood the world’s largest non-edible corn dog. And if that’s not enough to get tourists to stop, the restaurant also has a riding mechanical corn dog, which McNamer says is the world’s first.
It all makes The Original Pronto Pup one of the best roadside attractions on the Oregon coast (not to mention a successful fast-food restaurant in a busy tourist town), but celebrating the history of the corn dog is the eatery’s true raison d’être.
Owner Anthony McNamer adjusts the saddle of his mechanical corndog outside the new Pronto Pup restaurant in Rockaway Beach.Samantha Swindler/The Oregonian
You can buy three Original Pups and a side of tots for $11.Samantha Swindler/The Oregonian
Constance Rhodes wipes down a table during the grand opening day of the Pronto Pup in Rockaway Beach.Samantha Swindler/The Oregonian
In the late 1930s, Rockaway Beach hot dog vendors George and Vera Boyington first dipped hot dogs in a special batter and deep-fried them, seeking a way to avoid soggy buns. The Boyingtons called their creations Pronto Pups, and originally sold them out of a soda fountain window in Portland in 1941. Pronto Pup franchises began to pop up across the country, as the corn dog became a fair food and fast-food staple.
Today, Pronto Pups are largely found at carnivals and local fairs, though a few independent locations remain. The distinctive batter that differentiates a Pronto Pup from other corn dogs is sold out of a tiny Southwest Portland storefront, which also sells concessions supplies for parties and events.
But while you might be able to get a Pronto Pup at your local county fair, nobody celebrates Oregon’s famous corn dog quite like the restaurant in Rockaway Beach.
McNamer said The Original Pronto Pup remains a popular and successful business, offering standard $3 corn dogs as well as options like spicy sausages, footlong hot dogs, zucchinis and pickles deep-fried in the same batter. It’s stayed successful throughout the pandemic, he said, earning a profit from the busy tourism season on the coast in 2020.
“It’s kind of a cash cow,” McNamer said. “We just have the perfect business.”
So why sell it?
McNamer said that while he owns the business, its day-to-day operations are run by his 70-year-old mother, who has been eying retirement for the last two years. His life is too busy to take over the restaurant himself, he said, so he’s hoping somebody else can step in and keep his vision going.
In the latest offering, McNamer is asking $200,000 for the business, saying that is equal to one year of gross sales at the restaurant – an unambitious number, the owner conceded, due to the fact that he runs the business only 116 days of the year, including four days a week in the summer.
“I am selling the business for $200,000 and I will lease the building and lot at essentially my cost of $2500/month,” McNamer wrote in his Craigslist offering. “I would also sell both lots and the buildings for an additional $650,000.”
This is the second time McNamer has tried to sell The Original Pronto Pup, following a failed effort last year. A few potential buyers have shown interest, he said, but so far no one has stepped up. He’s hoping to make a deal by the end of the restaurant’s 2021 season in November.
Selling the restaurant is a necessary step for the family that owns and operates the attraction, but it will be a bittersweet moment when it comes. For the Portland lawyer, corn dogs have not just been business, but a part of his identity for the last five years.
“All my friends call me the corn dog king, it’s like this running joke,” McNamer said. “It will be very weird if I go to Pronto Pup and I have to pay for a corn dog.”
--Jamie Hale; jhale@oregonian.com; 503-294-4077; @HaleJamesB
The Link LonkFebruary 23, 2021 at 10:33PM
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The Original Pronto Pup, popular corn dog restaurant on Oregon coast, is up for sale - OregonLive
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