Mistake or marketing genius? Buc-ee’s billboard on Texas highway misspells ‘Howdy’

Is it an attention-getting billboard or simply a misspelling? Only officials at Buc-ee’s know for sure.

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A billboard promoting the country store chain’s location in Temple, Texas, was spied by sharp-eyed motorists with the phrase, “You Had Me At Hodwy,” according to a Facebook post.

Buc-ee’s, which has its headquarters in Lake Jackson, Texas, has used its billboards to promote its restaurants, clean bathrooms and even the chain’s Beaver Nuggets, the Houston Chronicle reported. It is a marketing strategy made famous by South of the Border in Dillon, South Carolina, and to a lesser extent, Rock City in Lookout Mountain, Georgia.

Buc-ee’s begins promoting its locations on billboards many miles from a restaurant’s location, KHOU-TV reported.

The typographical error in question was first reported by Kicks 105, a country radio station in Lufkin. Morning radio announcer Danny Merrell said the typo was discovered by his wife, an English teacher, who snapped a photograph of the sign on Interstate 35, about 73 miles from the Buc-ee’s in Temple, the Chronicle reported.

If the spelling error was intentional to draw attention to Buc-ee’s, it would be similar to one discovered in northern Colorado, the Chronicle reported. According to K99, a country music station in the area, Buc-ee’s posted its logo upside down on a billboard promoting a new store in the Johnstown area.”

Merrell called the sign in Texas an “attention-getter,” whether it was a spelling error or a marketing ploy. Either way, Merrell said he had “no doubt” that “the marketing geniuses at Buc-ee’s will use it to their favor.”

Officials at Buc-ee’s have not commented about the sign.

“In the event that HODWY was an oversight, my wife (an English teacher) would like to know if you are hiring a spell-checker,” Merrell wrote on the radio station’s website. “She has seen the signs in your store indicating the pay rates for employees, and after doing some comparisons to her current salary, she would like to apply for a possible spell-checker position.

“... Uh, so would I,” Merrell said.