Wawa

Think about 7-Eleven, ampm (no capital letters, hyphens, slashes or spaces - I didn't know), Circle K, Oxxo, Family Mart, Daily Yamazaki, or any of the other convenience stores that you know about. Now think of them as very clean with really good coffee and food. That's Wawa.

Wawa is a chain of about 540 stores in the mid-Atlantic region of the United States. They're literally all over the place in the Philadelphia area. Every time I come in I have to hit up Wawa for coffee and sandwiches like I did today for lunch.

From the outside, Wawa could be almost any (nice) convenience store:


It's what's inside that counts. Here's a shot of the coffee area. They have regular, unleaded, flavored, and usually one "exotic" coffee like Kona or Peruvian or something like that.


From here, you take your coffee to the "fixins" area where they have Half-n-Half, milk, cream, powdered, flavored, sugar, fake sugar, Splenda, lids, stirrers, cup insulators, and about 450 other options and accessories. It's a little silly but fun. They even have their signature blend available in bags above all the other stuff. I usually just do some Half-n-Half with a couple of Splendas.


Wawa has an in-house deli that sells lunch meats and some other stuff but they also make a variety of sandwiches that are good. You order your sandwich at a touch-screen interface that's impersonal at worst and error-free at best. Here's the deli in action:


I ordered a fairly vanilla sandwich today. Just some turkey and American cheese on a roll with bacon, mayo, hot peppers (not very spicy), tomato, lettuce, and pickles. As with most photos of food, this doesn't look that appetizing but is really good...


If you find yourself in the mid-Atlantic region and "gottahava" (Wawa's slogan) sandwich and/or coffee, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. Oh yeah, they also have a full convenience store with all the other stuff you'd expect; sodas, candy, snacks, and so on. It's good. Trust me!