To scarf up Iowa caucus votes, Pizza Ranch a near-must
"I feel at home. I'm at a Pizza Ranch."
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee sat at a table in the buffet chain's Council Bluffs location in late March. His town hall meeting was winding down, and he would soon hop in a car to another meeting at another Pizza Ranch (this one in Sioux City). But with the smells of fried chicken and pepperoni in the air, the winner of the 2008 Iowa caucuses waxed nostalgic.
"I largely won it because of Pizza Ranches all over the state," Huckabee said. "We created the Pizza Ranch strategy. A lot of people have copied it since then, but I think we created it."
Presidential hopefuls campaigning at Pizza Ranches across Iowa — the "Pizza Ranch circuit," the media call it — has become a staple of the Iowa caucuses. The down-home, Western-themed restaurants offer a microcosm of the caucuses' retail-heavy politics: The nation's next leader may stand before you as you scarf an all-you-can-eat buffet for $10.51.
More than 70 Pizza Ranches operate across Iowa, mostly in small towns. All offer a free meeting space to anyone who signs up and buys some pizza, making them the go-to venue for campaigns light on cash.
Huckabee glad-handed heavily at Pizza Ranches ahead of his 2008 Iowa victory. So did Rick Santorum before he won the caucuses in 2012. Now both are gearing up for 2016 runs, and both have returned to the Pizza Ranch circuit.
Other presidential aspirants have also appeared at the chain this go-around: Jeb Bush, Carly Fiorina and Marco Rubio.
"Now I have fulfilled my dream of coming to a Pizza Ranch," Rubio said at the chain's Pella restaurant last fall.
Pizza Ranch's mission, to "glorify God by positively impacting the world," endears itself to evangelical conservatives in small-town Iowa while attracting candidates looking for their votes. Christian music plays softly at many locations.
"The people who typically go to a Pizza Ranch or go through the buffet with their families were Mike Huckabee-type voters," said Chip Saltsman, Huckabee's 2008 campaign manager. "You go where your base is."
Cody Pierce, Pizza Ranch's vice president of marketing, oversees expansion and branding for the company, which began in Hull, Ia., and spread to 13 states. He acknowledges that "the endearing quality of Pizza Ranch could match well with certain political candidates," but stresses the chain doesn't endorse any political ideology.
Its president does, though: Weeks before the 2008 Iowa caucuses, Adrie Groeneweg, the chain's co-founder, donated $1,000 to Huckabee. Groeneweg also donated $5,000 to social conservative activist Bob Vander Plaats' run for governor in 2010.
But candidates of all political stripes visit Pizza Ranches: Democrat Hillary Clinton was the first to set foot in one ahead of 2008, according to Register data. She drew 200 people to the Emmetsburg Pizza Ranch in May 2007. (She hasn't visited one since.)
Democrats Joe Biden, John Edwards, Chris Dodd and Bill Richardson also appeared at Pizza Ranches for their '08 campaigns. No Democratic presidential candidate — prospective or declared — has held a Pizza Ranch event in the 2016 cycle, however.
While the 35-year-old company's is nearly as old as the caucuses itself, Pierce said executives didn't notice political candidates frequenting the restaurant until 2008 — the year Huckabee won Iowa.
If Huckabee launched the Pizza Ranch trend, it was out of necessity. The former Arkansas governor's campaign was broke in its early days and struggled for attention.
Huckabee's staff realized the restaurants functioned as de facto gathering places in many small Iowa towns.
"They've got all those nice little side rooms," said Saltsman, the campaign manager. "You get a couple pizzas there, and you might get a little action."
In July 2007, Huckabee was luring 40 people to hear his stump speech at North Liberty's Pizza Ranch. By August, 50 people came to the Pizza Ranch in Pella.
As interest picked up in weeks leading to the caucuses, the campaign stuck largely to Pizza Ranches, which Saltsman by then viewed as a good luck charm.
"I remember Mount Pleasant. Good Lord, every stop in the northwest," said Eric Woolson, a longtime Iowa campaign operative who led Huckabee's Iowa effort. "Typically, if I had the Pizza Ranch option, I was using it."
Other campaigns used it too. In 2008, long-shot Republican candidate John Cox visited nine Pizza Ranches in 10 days, according to Register archives.
In 2012, the trend broke open: Michele Bachmann spoke at 20 Pizza Ranches within 12 days in December as she tried to visit every Iowa county.
The day before Santorum edged out eventual GOP nominee Mitt Romney in the caucuses, he spoke at three Pizza Ranches in a day. (One of those Pizza Ranches, in Boone, even named a "Santorum Salad" after him.)
So far in the 2016 cycle, Huckabee leads the way in Pizza Ranch stops with three — no other candidate has done more than one. Huckabee will make an official announcement about entering the race Tuesday. On Thursday, he's scheduled to appear at a Pizza Ranch in Cedar Rapids.
Huckabee is better known — and better funded — than he was in 2008, yet Saltsman, who's been traveling with him in Iowa, sees the Pizza Ranch circuit in their future.
"Like I said, we feel like it's a good luck charm."
BY THE NUMBERS
Since 2008, The Des Moines Register has collected records of candidates' campaign stops across Iowa at diners, coffee shops and, yes, Pizza Ranches.
Here's a look at which presidential candidates hit the circuit first and most often in that time, according to our data and archives. Dive into our full 2016 Candidate Tracker online, with maps, graphs and stats on this cycle's candidates, at DesMoinesRegister.com/CandidateTracker.
2008 IOWA CAUCUSES
First candidate to visit a Pizza Ranch: Democrat Hillary Clinton, on May 26, 2007, in Emmetsburg.
Most Pizza Ranches visited: Republicans Mike Huckabee and John Cox, who each visited at least 11 locations.
Most-visited Pizza Ranch: Emmetsburg.
Eventual caucus winners: Republican Mike Huckabee and Democrat Barack Obama (no Pizza Ranch visits).
2012 IOWA CAUCUSES
First candidate to visit a Pizza Ranch: Republican Tim Pawlenty on April 1, 2011, in Newton.
Most Pizza Ranches visited: Republican Michele Bachmann, who visited at least 24 locations.
Most-visited Pizza Ranch: Manchester.
Eventual caucus winner: Republican Rick Santorum (at least 14 locations visited).
2016 IOWA CAUCUSES (so far)
First candidate to visit a Pizza Ranch: Republican Marco Rubio, on Oct. 28, 2014, in Pella.
Most Pizza Ranches visited: Republican Mike Huckabee, who has visited three locations.
Most-visited Pizza Ranch: Cedar Rapids, with two visits by the end of last week.
AVOIDING THE PIZZA RANCH
In 2012, every Republican candidate made a Pizza Ranch appearance save one: eventual nominee Mitt Romney.
Romney's second presidential campaign intentionally avoided the chain because of a scandal surrounding one of its co-founders, the Cedar Rapids Gazette reported.
Co-founder Lawrence Vander Esch, a Sioux City businessman, pleaded guilty in 2001 to charges that he sexually abused employees. Vander Esch, who is no longer with the company, was released from prison in 2006. A district court judge vacated the charges.
It was enough for Romney's 2012 campaign, led in Iowa by Des Moines strategist David Kochel, to eschew the chain altogether. Kochel, now a strategist for Jeb Bush, took a different tack ahead of 2016: Bush's first real retail stop took place at a Cedar Rapids Pizza Ranch.
"A lot of time has passed," Kochel told the Gazette the night of the event.
THE CROWD CONUNDRUM
The March 7 Pizza Ranch stop by Jeb Bush drew a stampede of politics watchers and journalists to the restaurant.
While 60 people RSVP'd to the event, about 150 showed up, wreaking traffic jams around buffet lines and snaking lines through bathrooms.
Such Pizza Ranch moments are nirvana for political junkies. For Iowans just wanting some dinner with the family, they can prove a bit irritating.
At Huckabee's Council Bluffs stop in March, a crowd of journalists and aides who were surrounding him blocked off the fried chicken buffet, leaving one elderly customer at a standstill. Other diners looked up from their plates unfazed at the commotion.
"Oh, hey, Mike," one man said to the White House hopeful.