WAUCONDA – Vernon Dreher understands the meaning of patience. He waited nearly a quarter of a century to open a new Dairy Queen store in Wauconda. This past August, his vision became reality when he opened a Dairy Queen store on Highway 176 and Main Street.
But Dreher’s passion for good ice cream in Wauconda started years earlier with the original Wauconda Dairy Queen store, once located about two blocks southwest from the new store’s site.
“We used to go as teenagers,” the 65-year old Barrington resident recalled. “One day, I went up to the window and said, ‘I’d like to buy this place.’ The owner shouted out from the back, ‘Make an offer!’”
Dreher gave it his best shot.
“I had no idea what I was offering, and I didn’t have any money anyway,” he laughed.
He and the owner joked about his naive offer, but “a few weeks later, the owner’s wife came out and she said, ‘I thought you were going to buy the place?’”
From there, conversations about Dreher eventually purchasing the Wauconda store grew more serious. A few years later, the owner died and his wife, realizing she couldn’t operate the store by herself, called Dreher to see if he was still interested. The asking price had gone up due to some recent renovations, but Dreher wasn’t about to let that stand in his way.
On June 4, 1969, Dreher, along with a close friend who also visited that Dairy Queen as a teenager, pulled together what little savings they had, mortgaged their parents’ homes and worked out a financing plan with the previous owner’s wife.
“And away we went,” Dreher said.
Over the next several years, Dreher and his partner bought and sold Dairy Queen stores throughout the area, owning and operating a total of 17 stores, but they always kept the Wauconda-Lake Zurich franchise.
Dreher eventually bought out his partner, and his wife, Sandra, daughter, Elizabeth, and sons Benjamin and Brad, stepped in to help operate the five stores they own today.
“It’s sort of like a family sticking together to get the job done,” Dreher said. “When the banks weren’t lending money to build this new store, the daughter and the sons all donated money toward the cause.”
Dreher said it took longer than expected to build the store.
“But we had to pay for everything,” he said. “As a result, we know that this store is going to be successful.”
Unlike the old Wauconda Dairy Queen, the new store doesn’t have indoor seating. It also doesn’t have an expanded grill menu. Still, Dreher isn’t apprehensive about his plans to keep the location open during winter.
“This store has a drive-through window, so people don’t have to get out of their cars,” he explained. “And because we put a nice overhang on the building, no one is going to get rained or snowed on when they come up to the window.”
Wauconda customers are happy to hear ice cream will be available even in below-freezing temperatures.
“So many places close down in the winter, so it’s good that it’s going to be here,” said Mike Donnely of Wauconda. “We’ll definitely support it. It’s been longtime needed.”
The store’s highly visible and easily accessible location provide two additional advantages the original Wauconda store didn’t have, advantages Dreher believes will keep business steady during the winter.
But after 42 years in the business, Dreher said it really comes down to one basic principal: focus on what you do best.
“And for us, that’s ice cream.”