It pays to advertise
A 20-foot statue of the transformer “BumbleBee” has landed at an Elmo, Texas convenience store he now calls home — The Bee Mart. People driving down a rural stretch of Texas Highway 80 through Elmo, about 40 miles east of Dallas, are pumping the brakes to take pictures. Not of the high gas prices, but a whopping 20-foot Transformer Bumblebee lookalike that now stands outside The Bee Mart. Why BumbleBee chose Kaufman County remains “a mystery.” Perhaps the a rural gas station, store/restaurant off the Decepticons radar, but the owner says the story continues to evolve in his mind. In short, The Bee Mart is themed entirely to his liking, everything from the convenience store, to the restaurant, are black and yellow.
The 20-foot-tall statue of Bumblebee was an attraction as it was trucked from the coast and then hoisted by crane atop a five-foot-high concrete pedestal next to the gas pumps. The statue came from China, where it was built of car parts and scrap metal. Its eyes glow blue at night. His journey more than 8,000 miles. “Why here?” employees at The Bee Mart frankly had no idea. They also noted that sales at The Bee Mart had doubled since the statue’s arrival.
BumbleBee now towers 25 feet above fans and families that take this rural stretch of U.S. Highway 80 to grab photos with the bright yellow Autobot. While BumbleBee may be the draw, the hook is most certainly The Bee Mart’s hamburgers which, the owner says, is their specialty. And, if you find yourself there on a Tuesday, be sure to grab some $1 Taco Tuesday street tacos. “Some days our parking lot’s just full, you can’t even find a place to park out there because there’s so many people.” I think it’s kind of interesting. I just sit here looking at it trying to figure out how they made that out of car parts,” With a concept in mind, and a plan for something different, Bee Mart in Elmo certainly hit the mark. The Bumblebee lookalike is no Optimus Prime, but he’s turned The Bee Mart into a prime destination in North Texas.
The group of young men in Baoding, China that built our Texas Bumblebee recently amazed their own country with their craftsmanship by making replicas of all the Transformers out of used car parts. Their largest model, an Optimus Prime, is over 38 feet in height. A replica of Bumblebee autonomously changes forms as smoothly as it did in the “Transformers” fiction cartoon series. They have been making the replicas for more than ten years and are now selling them internationally.
Transformer shorts
What would RoboCop be called if he was a Transformer?
Stoptimus Crime
What did Optimus Prime say when he came back from Ikea?
Autobots, assemble!
Two Transformers got married. Soon thereafter, they had a baby Transformer. But at that moment when they had a baby, they suddenly could not be seen anymore.
They had become Transparents.
What is Transformer BumbleBee’s favorite coffee?
A Chevro-latte!
June 13th Birthdays
1986 – Ashley Olson, Mary Kate Olson, 1987 – Kat Dennings, 1989 – Lisa Tucker
1982 – Chris Evans, 1991 – Aaron Taylor Johnson, 1953 – Tim Allen, 1978 – Ethan Embry