The Midwest's Taco Empire - Taco John's

Ajouté : 2026-06-04

[00:00:00]Okay, everybody likes to argue over which part of the country has the best regional burger chain. You've got In-N-Out Burger in the West Coast.

[00:00:04]You've got What a Burger in the South.

[00:00:06]The East Coast has Five Guys and Shake Shack. And the Midwest has Culver's. But nobody likes to argue over which region has the best fast Mexican food. And that's because there's no real competition because if there was, the Midwest would absolutely win.

[00:00:21]Today, we're talking about Taco John's.

[00:00:23]All right, it is it is an enigma. If you've never heard of it, it's probably because you don't live in the Midwest.

[00:00:27]But if you live in the Midwest, you definitely know what Taco John's is.

[00:00:30]Okay? It's like it's like the Dollar General of fast food chains. There's entire towns in Iowa that have a thousand people. And the only businesses in these towns are the post office, a Casey's gas station, a Dollar General, and a Taco John's. Which raises the same question that everybody has about Dollar General, just why? Why is this here?

[00:00:47]Like, you could climb to the top of Mount Everest. There's a [ __ ] Dollar General there for no apparent reason.

[00:00:51]It's the same thing with Taco John's in the Midwest. And then it dawns on me, they're targeting white people that have never had tacos in their entire lives.

[00:00:58]Okay, they'll probably never admit that, but I'm going to prove it right after a word from our sponsor. THIS VIDEO IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY World War II Supremacy, a free-to-play online military-based strategy game where you can play with up to 99 other people, forge alliances, or take on the world by yourself. And while taking over the WORLD IS PRETTY FUN, YOU can also play my favorite game mode where you get to pick a state within the United States and go to war with all the other states trying to take over America. I think this time around I'm going to start off as Iowa, per usual. Then I'm going to attack Diet Canada, aka Minnesota. Then we'll probably move over to Wisconsin, take over the rest of the Midwest. That way I don't have to share Taco John's with anybody else. Also worth mentioning, they've just incorporated a new shadow exchange function. Basically, the black market where you can do underground illegal deals, and if you get caught, you suffer a loss in morale.

[00:01:39]Okay, sidebar note to the developers. It should probably be the other way around, at least for America, because every time we get caught doing sketchy stuff, people just get pumped. Like a couple of months ago, we just straight up yonked another country's president in the middle of the night and all the Americans did was make military montages over Toby Keith music on Instagram.

[00:01:54]Anyways, go check out World War II Supremacy. It's free to play. I'll have a link over there. There's a URL code right there. Let's get back to the video. All right, buckle up because of all the restaurant stories I've told, this one might be the most insane. Our story begins in Cheyenne, Wyoming in 1968, where a local businessman by the name of Harold Holm, who runs a very successful business building mobile homes, is thriving. In addition to making double whites, he also makes campers. And what do you do when you make campers? You got to take them out on a test drive, right? So, he's traveled all over the country with his wife staying in campers. And during his travels, he's discovered Mexican food.

[00:02:26]>> It's a whole new meat delivery system.

[00:02:28]>> Okay. Again, you got to remember this is the 1960s. Mexican food is far from mainstream at this point. You pretty much had to be like down in the Southwest, maybe over in California, if you wanted to even know what a taco was.

[00:02:39]Most of the country hadn't even heard of this [ __ ] yet. But Harold loves him some tacos. He tries to convince the guy running the taco stand that he should move up to Cheyenne, Wyoming, and open up a taco stand there, telling him, and I quote, "It's a real barn burner."

[00:02:55]Apparently, that wasn't convincing.

[00:02:56]>> I don't even know what that means.

[00:02:58]>> No one knows what it means, but it's provocative.

[00:03:00]>> No, it's not.

[00:03:01]>> Get the people going.

[00:03:02]>> So, now Harold's got a problem. He can't get tacos when he's at home in Cheyenne, Wyoming, which is awful, right? I mean, nobody wants to make a pilgrimage to go get tacos every Tuesday. It's a disaster. But then one day, a guy by the name of John Turner moves to town and he he used to work in a taco stand. And when Harold hears that Jon wants to set up a little taco stand so he can sell tacos at the local parade known as Frontier Days in Cheyenne, Wyoming, he's like, "Say less." Harold springs into action. He hooks Jon up with his real estate agent, Jim. Jim gets him a plot of land. While that's going on, Harold proceeds to work 16-hour days for like a week straight and builds him a custom double wide trailer so that he can sell tacos out of it at Frontier Days. John is a man of focus, commitment, sheer.

[00:03:51]>> With the backing of Harold and Jim, Jon goes from the idea of like, "Hey, I want to sell tacos at the parade to owning a restaurant in less than a week." So, he starts selling tacos at Pioneer Days, and the restaurant's immediately a success right out of the gate. Because obviously, you're selling tacos to people that have never experienced tacos in their entire lives. Okay, now I'm inferring a lot here, but think about this from John's perspective. You literally just moved to town and you were like, "Yeah, I know how to make tacos." And two wealthy businessmen build you a restaurant and tell you to start making tacos. He's like, "I don't I didn't really ask for I just wanted to make tacos for the parade and now I'm like running a restaurant. and I don't know that this is this is what I wanted to do. So, he goes to Harold and Jim like right out of the gate and is like, "Hey, do you guys want to like buy the franchising rights for this or whatever?" And they're like, "Yes, yes, we will buy the franchising rights." Or, as Harold put it, and I quote, "When you got a tiger by the tail, you hang on.

[00:04:43]>> I don't even understand the reference.

[00:04:45]>> You don't understand what you said?

[00:04:46]>> I don't know what that is."

[00:04:47]>> Okay, they've got this figured out.

[00:04:48]They're sitting on top of a gold mine.

[00:04:50]Literally, just expose the rest of the country to tacos. You're going to make a ton of money. So, they get to work and the way they go about it is absolutely hilarious. Apparently, one of them owns a plane. So, together they hop in this plane and just fly around the Midwest.

[00:05:01]Literally doing aerial reconnaissance like it's a scouting mission. One of them's flying the plane. The other one's sitting in the cockpit with binoculars like, "Okay, we're coming up on a small town. Man, that construction site's moving pretty slow and they're not moving very fast picking those crops.

[00:05:14]They definitely don't have Mexicans.

[00:05:15]They don't know what tacos are. Land the plane." Okay, you think I'm joking. I'm not. They land the plane and then they split up. Jim, the real estate guy, goes and finds a plot of land while Harold goes and finds a franchisee to run the business for him. Hey, do you understand how insane this is? Like two wealthy businessmen landing their private plane in the middle of a cornfield, walking up to a farmer and being like, "Hey, how would you like to run a taco stand?" Oh, you don't know what a taco is? It's like It's like a Mexican hot dog. Here, try this. How would you like to bring this to your community? Oh, by the way, I own a factory where I build double wide trailers. We'll actually build you the restaurant. We'll bring it here and set it up for you. Okay.

[00:05:50]>> It's like speedr runninging the Field of Dreams. It's not if you build it, they will come. It's two dudes coming up to your door being like, "Here, you're a taco salesman now." Like, if I ever get a time machine, I'm going back in time and watching this sales pitch occur just so I can see him convince some farmer from Nebraska to open a taco stand because apparently it works repeatedly because there's like 400 Taco John's locations across the country right now.

[00:06:11]And by the way, when I said they were specifically targeting white people that had never had tacos, I meant it. Okay, here's here's the locations of every Taco John's in the country. Okay, you got that map down? Now, also I'm going to put next to it the map of Hispanic population density in states.

[00:06:31]Told you they're on to me, dude. Those guys are sharp as nails up there. You can't put anything PAST THEM.

[00:06:36]>> OKAY. WHY DO you think they got away with calling it Taco John's and not Taco Wands? They're selling it to people that don't know any better, which is great.

[00:06:41]It's a genius business model, but I'm sure, as you could imagine, it would cause some problems when you're selling tacos to people that have only ever had burgers and fries. They're looking at the taco like it's a burger, and they're asking themselves the question, "Where's the fries?" Now, this is the point of the story where every other Mexican restaurant ever says, "We don't do that." Or, "Hey, here's some free chips and salsa. We don't do fries." Not Harold and Jim. Harold and Jim are like, "These [ __ ] want potatoes.

[00:07:05]We're going to sell them potatoes." So, they go back to Harold and they're like, "The people want Mexican French fries.

[00:07:09][ __ ] figure it out." Harold goes into the lab and what he comes up with is the potato olay. And apparently the Gen 1 potato Olay didn't last very long because it had some, we'll call it design flaws. Essentially, it was a deep fried tater tot filled with reffried beans, which sounds delicious. However, it is very similar to a pizza bite in that the filling is apparently the temperature of the [ __ ] sun, which obviously ruins the entire business model, right? We're trying to get white people hooked on tacos. And if the first thing they do is take a bite of a deep fried tater tot and then they burn the [ __ ] out of the roof of their mouth with liquid hot reffried beans, they're not going to be able to taste how delicious tacos are. So, we can't have it. So, John goes back into the lab, takes the reffried beans out, has this like coin-shaped tater tot thing that he then seasons with his secret blend of herbs and spices that he made in his basement. No, that's not an exaggeration. For a period of time, John was literally making all the seasoning for all the potato allays for all of the franchises in his basement. And let me tell you right now, they're [ __ ] delicious. They outdo any French fry I've ever had in my entire life. If you go to Taco John's for anything, go get the potato oasis. Now, obviously, it goes without saying that selling spicy tater tots out of a double wide trailer to white people that don't know what tacos are is an outrageous success. So, they just start putting these potato oas in [ __ ] everything. And it just becomes like the staple item of the entire menu. Like the burrito, oh, we're putting potato oaslays inside of it.

[00:08:30]It's a meat and potato burrito.

[00:08:32]Breakfast burritos, spicy tater tots, scrambled eggs, bacon, and sausage. It's delicious. Outside of the potato allays, nothing special going on with this menu.

[00:08:39]Okay. It is your garden variety fast Mexican food. It is ultrarocessed meat, some cheese, some lettuce inside of a tortilla.

[00:08:45]>> Nachos. Tortilla with cheese, meat, or vegetables. Ow. Well, then what is a burrito?

[00:08:52]>> Tortilla with cheese, meat, or vegetable.

[00:08:54]>> Okay, it's white people tacos. We're just going to call it what it is, which traditionally everybody knows is like meh, whatever. Unless, you know, you're drunk and it's 2 o'clock in the morning, in which case they're delicious. And everybody knows this. This is why Taco John's and Taco Bell are both open super late because they want to be the only option because that's how they make money. Okay, Taco John's just took it a step further. They're like, "Hey, the Midwest in the 1960s and '7s, nobody's even had Mexican food and none of these towns even have a fast food restaurant.

[00:09:18]It's basically 2:00 in the morning everywhere." Okay, and I know what you're thinking, but it's not literally 2:00 in the morning and these people aren't drunk, so the tacos just aren't going to hit the same. Okay. Yes. Yes, they are because they've never had tacos before. Okay, so even if it's a shitty taco, it's still the best taco you've ever had in your entire life if you've never had a taco before. IT'S LIKE SELLING SINGLE PLY TOILET paper to somebody that's never used toilet paper before. Okay, if you've used toilet paper, you are well aware that single ply toilet paper sucks. It was invented by the devil so you get poop on your finger.

[00:09:46]>> Oh my god, [ __ ] everywhere.

[00:09:50]>> [ __ ] >> Oh my god.

[00:09:52]>> Got your ass. But if you've been wiping your ass with corn cobs and leaves your entire life, single ply toilet paper seems incredible. It's the same concept.

[00:09:59]Okay, I'm I'm sorry. I'm getting horrifically sidetracked. Anyways, >> I think then you would be most rewarded to consider this.

[00:10:07]>> On sale today. Come on down.

[00:10:09]>> Within a couple of years, John, Jim, and Harold got the Midwest on lock when it comes to Mexican food. And they start growing so fast that apparently they can't make trailers fast enough. So, they just start buying old gas stations and putting Taco John's inside of them.

[00:10:21]By the 1980s, they're a super legit franchise business. They adopt their official mascot, a guy in a sombrero with a mustache named Juan. See what they did there, John. Juan. It's clever.

[00:10:30]Also, he's got a donkey named Pepe.

[00:10:32]Don't worry about it. But then they hit marketing gold when they found Whiplash.

[00:10:35]Okay, Taco Bell had that little Chihuahua dog that was say Taquito Taco Bell, which apparently he got fired cuz that was racist for some reason. Well, Taco John's has Whiplash, which is a monkey that rides a dog that I'm pretty sure they hired from a rodeo. I can only imagine Harold and Jim went to a rodeo, saw a monkey riding a German Shepherd, and were like, "Holy [ __ ] I bet that monkey could sell so many potatoes." And they were right, cuz he was in like 50 commercials, and I saw him on TV every day for most of my childhood.

[00:11:06]>> Wow.

[00:11:07]>> Who brought this crunchy chicken and potato burrito?

[00:11:13]>> I love it when he does that. New grilled fajita platters only from Taco John's.

[00:11:18]>> And then by 1989, Harold, Jim, and John, I think they're getting a little bit cocky, to be honest with you. They're like, "You know what? We run the taco business in the Midwest. We own this. We own Mexican food." So they go to the US government and they're like, "We're going to go ahead and we're going to trademark the phrase taco Tuesday." And the US government is like, "Okay, sure."

[00:11:37]K, do you understand what I just told you? They literally own the phrase taco Tuesday now. Like nobody else is allowed to say it. Kane, if you're not from the Midwest, I know what you're thinking.

[00:11:46]What does Taco John's do for Taco Tuesday? You get a six-pack and a pound, homie. Which is slang for you get six tacos and a pound of potato allays, and it's fantastic. Okay, if you're not picking up what I'm putting down, I'm trying to tell you that three white guys selling a pound of spicy tater tots and six tacos out of a double wide trailer literally invented Taco Tuesday. I have the legal documentation to prove it. I don't ever want to hear white people don't have culture ever again.

[00:12:11]Anyways, moving on. Somehow this did not become a legal issue until like 30 years later when in 2019 LeBron James, like the NBA star, tried to also trademark the phrase Taco Tuesday because I guess he used to like to yell it on Tik Tok or some [ __ ] >> Don't know what today is. Today is Taco Tuesday.

[00:12:33]Taco Tuesday.

[00:12:34]>> The US government comes back to LeBron James and is like, A, you can't trademark that. It's in common use. be trailer park boys over here beat you to it 30 years ago. So LeBron James then teams up with Taco Bell to sue Taco John's so that everybody can have the right to use the phrase Taco Tuesday.

[00:12:50]They take it to court and Taco John's pretty much immediately folds knowing that there's no way they're going to win exclusive rights to use the phrase Taco Tuesday forever. So the CEO just puts out a press release that says, and I quote, "I'd like to thank our worthy competitors at Taco Bell for reminding everyone that Taco Tuesday is best celebrated at Taco John's."

[00:13:08]>> Impressive. Very nice.

[00:13:10]>> Now, in modern times, Taco John's obviously isn't sold out of a double wide trailer anymore, unfortunately, but they did keep a lot of that same heritage of being able to throw up restaurants quick. Basically, they have the majority of their restaurants built pre-fabricated in a factory. So, they have a company go in, pour the concrete pad, then they have another company come in and basically assemble this restaurant in what amounts to like 3 days. And they say it actually helps with marketing because people are like, "Oh, they're building something there.

[00:13:33]Oh [ __ ] there's a new restaurant there.

[00:13:34]We should go try it." Okay, definitely not a giant scop to convince you that Mexicans did it. As far as where they're deciding to put up new restaurants, that strategy kind of had to change because, well, everybody's tried Mexican food at this point and it's not working anymore.

[00:13:45]And a lot of the smaller towns that they used to dominate are either a dying off or they're growing and they're getting a lot more competition. So now, instead of being the only restaurant on Main Street, they're having to move closer to the highway and compete for interstate traffic. So, while the initial business model is kind of broken, they still have a strangle hold on the Midwest. And I'm not mad about it because I'm fat and I like spicy tater tots. So, yeah. Thanks for watching. Best way to support the channel is go buy some merch, maybe drink some echelon. All that's available over at the fatlectrician.com. Quackbang out.

[00:14:16]Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go get some potatoes.

[00:14:30]Don't forget to go check out Supremacy World War II. Unlock your rail gun and go conquer the British. It's what George Washington would have wanted.