A Dairy Queen representative confirmed that the restaurant is coming to Squamish, and that the establishment survived the windstorm.
The story around town was that the franchise would be showing up at the Solterra business park, across from Home Depot.
When the wind struck Dec. 20, a building under construction in that location was flattened, prompting worries that it would delay the arrival of the much-missed frozen treats.
Alas, fortunately for lovers of Blizzards and ice cream cakes, the structure that was pushed over was not the one that will be the future home of Dairy Queen.
“Dairy Queen is safe,” said Tony Watters, the director of Canadian franchise development for the company.
“We’re still on schedule. The building that we had had — the four walls and the roof had already been on and they’re a little bit further ahead. So the vanilla shell would almost be done in time for us to move in the next couple of weeks to start the fixturing, or turning the building into the Dairy Queen image.”
An operator has already been chosen, said Watters, and if everything continues on schedule, the store will be open in the spring of 2019.
“We’re coming back,” he said.
“We’re excited to be coming back. We’ve been looking at this market for quite some time. And really, what we were looking for was the right opportunity, and the right placement, and the right piece of real estate. And we think we have found that.”
It’s been a long time coming. A Dairy Queen was in Squamish for a while but closed its doors years ago.
Residents have since been mourning its absence.
About a year and a half ago, a Facebook post asked locals if they wanted the restaurant back in town.
The response was overwhelming. Within days, hundreds of commenters said they wanted the franchise to return.
Since then, Dairy Queen announced it was considering making a comeback.
