Where To Find Those Rare, Non-Huge, Normal-Sized Buc-Ee's Fueling Stations

Buc-ee's seems to have big plans for global dominance, which is about what you'd expect from a gas station/convenience store chain that's the epitome of American excess. Then again, a lot about the company is big, and Buc-ee's holds two size-related world records. For example, the Buc-ee's store in Luling, Texas – opened in 2024 to replace the company's original travel center – spans 75,593 square feet. That makes it the largest convenience store in the world, and a separate Buc-ee's site in Texas, in Katy, features the world's longest car-wash conveyor belt at 255 feet. Meanwhile, the first Buc-ee's store in Arizona opened earlier this year, and it sprawls across 74,000 square feet — with the company planning to launch two more new locations in 2026. By 2031, another dozen stores are projected to open their doors in this country.

The chain's origins, though, were somewhat more modest. When Arch "Beaver" Aplin III opened his first store in Lake Jackson, Texas, it was about 3,000 square feet. On the one hand, that may be much smaller than today's titanic travel centers, but for reference, one of the convenience-store industry's top trade groups, the NACS, considers buildings ranging from 2,800 to 3,600 square feet to be "expanded convenience stores."

Buc-ee's continued to add similarly sized stores for years before deciding to supersize its operations. That happened in 2006 after Aplin and his business partner, Don Wasek, took advantage of some low real-estate prices to build out one of their stores to 17,000 square feet. The thing is, while Buc-ee's began opening bigger and bigger stores, it didn't necessarily close its regular-sized ones. As a result, you can still find a few of them, but only in the chain's home state of Texas.

The Buc-ee's corporate website has a handy list of all locations, of course, yet there doesn't seem to be a simple way to sort out the "regular" stores from the all-encompassing oversized travel centers. There are, however, several websites dedicated to helping you plan your road trips for maximum Buc-ee's benefits. And at least one of them, Roadtripbeaver, has an interactive map that includes the "non-travel centers" along with the travel centers themselves. It even includes the locations for some of the upcoming stores as well.

Going by that map indicates the remaining conventionally-sized Buc-ee's locations are mostly clustered in an area going from Houston to the north and to Freeport, on the Gulf of America, to the south. However, the site also makes things simple with a plain old list of locations, and according to that list, you can find the smaller Buc-ee's in the following Texas cities: Alvin, Angleton (three stores), Brazoria, Cypress, Eagle Lake, Freeport (two stores), Giddings, Lake Jackson (three stores), League City, Pearland (two stores), Port Lavaca, and Richmond.

Now, the smaller stores may not have quite the selection of tchotchkes as the bigger ones. The Buc-Ee's-branded oddities available at the travel centers can range from Hawaiian shirts, perfect for an impromptu gas-station luau, to Buc-ee's throw pillows for home decor and 60-inch plush beavers that will cost you $5,000. Just be aware they aren't sold at all Buc-ee's outlets. Anyway, the point is that the smaller dimensions of these Texas stores could be an ideal way for Buc-ee's first-timers to enjoy the experience without getting overwhelmed.