13 Secrets Buc-Ee's Employees Don't Want You To Know

Buc-ee's is beloved by many and has a reputation for tasty food, friendly employees, gas galore, and yes, those clean bathrooms. But it has its share of controversies and unsavory news, just like any company around today. Some of these issues have little to do with actual Buc-ee's locations and employees, only involving the company because of something a relative did elsewhere, or because someone decided to violate the company's copyright. However, other incidents involve unpleasant or illegal behavior aimed at customers or even toward other co-workers, and a couple are good examples of just how seriously Buc-ee's takes employment contracts. (The good news is that one of these "secrets" can benefit you if you can't visit Buc-ee's in person.)

Even the most well-liked companies have to deal with issues that they'd rather sweep under the rug, and it's always important to note that having the Buc-ee's name attached to controversies doesn't mean everyone working there is responsible for it. (Always be nice to your servers, people.) With that said, let's investigate these 13 secrets that Buc-ee's employees don't want you to know.

Buc-ee's isn't accredited with the Better Business Bureau (BBB), but it still received a letter rating of F based on the company's unwillingness to answer complaints filed through the BBB. And it's not just one isolated location; the company headquarters in Lake Jackson, Texas, has this rating, as do many of its locations. There are a few that have different ratings; for example, there's a Buc-ee's in Fort Worth, Texas, and one in Smith's Grove, Kentucky, that, as of late 2025, both have an A-.

The BBB doesn't base ratings on reviews, but it does take a large number of unanswered complaints seriously. In Buc-ee's case, there are 90 unanswered complaints as of late November 2025, as well as an alert that says Buc-ee's has told the BBB it would not answer any complaints that the organization forwarded. The complaints tend to be about not being able to contact the company by phone, not getting answers to online complaints, and not being able to return items, including food.

Employees at a store should treat customers with respect regardless of race, gender, or other personal characteristics. However, three Texas customers say that was not the case at a Katy, Texas, location in April 2024. Vertina Jones, Jonitress Jones, and Jaylin McAllister said an employee accused them of shoplifting when they tried to buy things, and a manager stopped their attempt to pay and told them to leave. The three said the manager even laughed at them and started telling them they couldn't buy anything there because of their race. After the manager gave them a phone number that was supposed to be for a corporate office — but was actually disconnected — the three sued for $1 million.

Buc-ee's asked that the lawsuit be moved to a federal court. Discrimination claims are often considered matters for state courts, but federal courts can hear them, too. Buc-ee's didn't give a reason for why it wanted to move the case to federal court other than stating that it would be more appropriate for the nature of the accusations. The customers' lawyer said he wouldn't object to the move.

Buc-ee's isn't open about how much food gets thrown away, but it's a safe bet that it is throwing out unsold, perishable food. We don't have numbers, obviously, but some comments on Reddit mention locations throwing out hundreds of pounds of leftover food. Others report hearing that Buc-ee's gives some food to farmers for feed, but this could be an online rumor, as there's nothing to back this up other than a few social media comments.

Stores throwing out food is very common. While food waste is a problem in general, there are a number of reasons why restaurants, and places like Buc-ee's, toss so much instead of donating it. While there are laws allowing companies to donate cooked or perishable food, many companies just don't want to deal with the potential lawsuits over food poisoning or other complaints. Companies might not have enough storage space for older food, or may have batches of food that didn't taste good. The easiest way for stores to avoid being overrun with lots of unsold food and to avoid liability is to toss it.

Buc-ee's wanted to build a new location in Colorado and chose Palmer Lake for its second store in the state. Sounds simple enough, but the process of annexing the land unleashed political mayhem that resulted in threats of recalls for a number of town trustees, accusations of fraud, the resignation of the town's mayor and the pro-tem mayor, and pleas from the governor and senators to reconsider the site.

Buc-ee's wanted the town to annex some nearby land so that the company could use the town's water supply for its new location. But townspeople didn't like that, especially because the town was already under water restrictions. The town's decision to allow the request to go through additional evaluation (instead of rejecting the proposal outright) sparked more protests. Less than a week later, Mayor Glant Havenar resigned. Then, a former friend of the mayor posted screenshots of what appeared to be texts in which the mayor criticized opponents of Buc-ee's, allegedly calling them terrorists, cows, and losers, among other things. The mayor had also allegedly created a sockpuppet account that would defend her actions.

That wasn't the end of it. In September, the pro-tem mayor resigned after tabling further conversation. She claimed she'd been the target of accusations and intimidating behavior.

Buc-ee's takes copyright violations very seriously and will sue if it thinks your company or product is using a name or logo that's too close to its own. Infractions can be anything from a mascot graphic that follows the same style as Buc-ee's beaver — it went after a rest stop chain that used a graphic with an alligator in a similar yellow circle — to blatant copyright issues. Remember "Buk-ii's Super Mercado" in Matamoros, Mexico? The store actually painted a very familiar-looking (if apparently snoutless) beaver in a red cap on a yellow circle on its wall and saw Bu-cee's threaten to take action against it. 

In June 2025, Buc-ee's went after Born United, a South Carolina clothing company that decided to lift the Buc-ee's beaver graphic and give it a twist. The company started selling clothes with Buc-ee in military survival gear, holding a machine gun. Buc-ee's wasn't impressed and sued, claiming copyright infringement, while Born United's co-owner called Buc-ee's a bully. Local reaction was mainly amused at the blatant copying, with people noting that the store's merchandise contained other potential copyright problems, too.

Buc-ee's runs a tight ship, and the chain's policies regarding employee duties and behavior are strict. The dress code doesn't allow for much variation, the late policy is draconian (you can't be even a minute late, and if it happens three times, you're out), no phones are allowed on the floor, and while the company's lawyer says it complies with legal break and lunch times, there have been accusations that the employees' lunch and breaks are condensed into 10 minutes.

If you look online at reviews and forums where people discuss working conditions, you'll find a lot of complaints. The score for employee well-being on Indeed. com is 59, or "low." Other comments note getting only one 15-minute break for lunch, or sometimes having to work overtime (although that person also said that another shift would be adjusted so that you didn't go over 40 hours per week).

Reddit isn't much kinder. One poster repeated that lunch breaks were short, with no place to sit. Another confirmed the strict late policy and said it was difficult to change shifts, which could interfere with school if you wanted to take classes. Yet more commenters mentioned that they knew people who worked at Bu-cee's and that it wasn't an enjoyable experience. Granted, these are opinions and claims from accounts that we can't verify, but the comments don't help with the store's general employer reputation.

In 2014, then-state Senator Dan Patrick was running for lieutenant governor of Texas. In March 2014, he posted a picture of himself with Buc-ee (the mascot) and posted it on his Facebook page, claiming that he had Buc-ee's support for his campaign. That led Congressman Joaquin Castro to announce that he'd no longer go to Buc-ee's, given the company's apparent support of a politician who was known for anti-immigrant rhetoric. Some social media users started using a hashtag that called for a Buc-ee's boycott.

The chain quickly jumped in to do some damage control. The company's lawyer noted that the support was personal support from the founders and not a company-wide endorsement. He reiterated that the employees at Buc-ee's were from different backgrounds and had all sorts of views, and that the company's products were beyond political affiliation. Castro did ease up and state he'd no longer stay away now that the company had cleared things up, but he did state that Patrick's post had initially given him a different impression.

In 2023, a group of friends were at a home near Austin, Texas, with Mitchell Wasek, son of Buc-ee's co-founder Don Wasek, when one of them noticed what appeared to be a hidden camera in a charging port in the bathroom. The group took the charger and contacted police after finding a micro-card that contained recordings of people in different rooms, including bedrooms, doing things that you'd normally expect total privacy for.

In fact, the card contained several files from that home and a few others in Austin, Dallas, and Telluride, Colorado. Investigators also found Amazon records for camera purchases apparently made by Mitchell Wasek. He was arrested and released on bond; in 2024, he was indicted on 21 felony counts. In 2025, Mitchell Wasek was charged with an additional felony involving files that contained child pornography, and a warrant was issued for his arrest.

Texas is an at-will state, so if you want to quit your job on the spot, you can. That is, unless you have a contract that says otherwise. A former assistant manager found that out the hard way after she quit working at Buc-ee's. The company sued her for not quitting according to the terms of a contract she'd signed. The former employee, Kelley Rieves, had signed a contract to work from 2009 to 2013. However, she found another job in 2012 and left. About a year later, Buc-ee's sued her for what the company called retention pay, stating that the money she was paid as an assistant manager was actually two types of pay: her regular pay, and then extra money meant as a retention bonus. The company also said that she was supposed to give at least six months' notice.

Initially, things didn't look good for Rieves. Buc-ee's originally said she owed over $67,000, but by the time her court case was over, that amount had ballooned to $100,000. It also turned out that she had tried to negotiate before she left to have the contract voided. Buc-ee's had spoken with her about it when she left, offering her a few options for paying the money back or just staying to finish the contract. However, Rieves appealed, and a year later, she won her appeal. Buc-ee's was even ordered to pay her legal fees.

Employers are supposed to protect employees from inappropriate behavior, including sexual harassment. They're not supposed to retaliate against the employee who was victimized. Companies that fail to act appropriately can face lawsuits that target everyone at the company as a whole, right down to whoever did the harassing.

In June 2023, Carol Cooper started working at a Tennessee Buc-ee's as an overnight cashier. Unfortunately, one of her co-workers allegedly started harassing her, asking her out and trying to touch her. In September 2023, she reported this employee. Other women also came forward to accuse the same employee of harassing them (one even accused him of stalking), and a manager stated that they had spoken to the man. However, the behavior reportedly didn't stop, and Cooper filed a written complaint. Then, she says, she was fired. Buc-ee's claimed she left a shift early without authorization, but she says she had permission and accused Buc-ee's of retaliation. Cooper ended up suing Buc-ee's in 2024, and the case is ongoing as of this writing.

Sometimes employers will want you to sign over the rights to anything you create that has to do with the work you do for them. You really want a lawyer to look over contracts like that to make sure that you understand the terms and what you're agreeing to. But one former Alabama employee says he wasn't given a chance to run one such intellectual property agreement past a lawyer, as Buc-ee's had required him to sign it under pressure and over a weekend. The agreement dealt with proprietary rights and other legal issues, and it apparently led to the employee having to destroy work he'd done. He's now suing.

The former employee, John Pedersen, claims that after he signed the agreement, he told Buc-ee's that he'd created an HR tool, developed observations about delivery and marketing, and come up with more machine tools that could be used with different foods at Buc-ee's, all off the clock. Buc-ee's demanded Pederson destroy the work, stating that it was Buc-ee's property but that the company had no use for it. Pedersen eventually quit, and in May 2025, he filed suit against Buc-ee's for $20 million, claiming intellectual property theft and violation of constitutional rights.

Buc-ee's doesn't have an online store, so people hoping to score merch either have to plan a trip, get another person to go and buy stuff for them, or turn to a reseller. Typically, resellers buy Buc-ee's merchandise and resell it at a higher price to make a profit. Buc-ee's official stance is that these resellers are unauthorized and not endorsed by Buc-ee's. However, Buc-ee's isn't exactly going after the resellers in the same way it goes after copyright violators.

One such reseller that Buc-ee's lists as an example on its website is Texas Snax. When Texas Snax founder Chris Koerner realized that there was a market for sending Buc-ee's snacks to people in areas without a Buc-ee's, he bought one of every non-perishable item and created a website. His reasoning was that people who encountered Buc-ee's only on road trips would likely want more of those snacks and needed a way to get them. 

Buc-ee's lawyers did contact Koerner, but they were actually OK with his business as long as he didn't use the word "beaver" in the name and as long as he was clear that he wasn't part of the company. Koerner and other resellers continue to do brisk business. Of course, the resellers can't send you one important thing: They can't match the experience of going to Buc-ee's yourself and wandering through the aisles.

Buc-ee's isn't open about what it does with out-of-season merchandise, like Christmas items in January. However, according to some alleged former employee accounts on Reddit, holiday and other off-season merch is apparently thrown out. Some report that the items are actually tossed into an industrial trash compactor, rather than just sitting in a dumpster that anyone can sort through. Others say the merchandise is sent overseas. One Redditor reported that their location threw away over 1,500 holiday shirts and cups in 2024.

As disappointing as that sounds, it's actually common among companies. Many companies destroy unsold merchandise to prevent donated or found items from being resold at much lower prices. (This is different from the resellers we mentioned before because the resellers buy the merchandise themselves, rather than taking items they don't have to pay for, or that they pay only a little for.) The logic behind this is that letting people buy these items at super-low prices undercuts the company's sales. All people would have to do is wait until after the season and then find one of these discounted sellers.