The Pizza Ranch, Inc., founded in 1981, is a "fast casual" restaurant chain. Pizza Ranch offers pizza, chicken, a salad bar, and a pizza and chicken buffet. Pizza Ranch has over 145 locations in Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

, Iowa

Iowa

Iowa is a state located in the Midwestern United States, an area often referred to as the "American Heartland". It derives its name from the Ioway people, one of the many American Indian tribes that occupied the state at the time of European exploration. Iowa was a part of the French colony of New...

, Michigan

Michigan

Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....

, Minnesota

Minnesota

Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...

, Nebraska

Nebraska

Nebraska is a state on the Great Plains of the Midwestern United States. The state's capital is Lincoln and its largest city is Omaha, on the Missouri River....

, North Dakota

North Dakota

North Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States of America, along the Canadian border. The state is bordered by Canada to the north, Minnesota to the east, South Dakota to the south and Montana to the west. North Dakota is the 19th-largest state by area in the U.S....

, Oklahoma

Oklahoma

Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...

, South Dakota

South Dakota

South Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux American Indian tribes. Once a part of Dakota Territory, South Dakota became a state on November 2, 1889. The state has an area of and an estimated population of just over...

, Wisconsin

Wisconsin

Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...

 and Kansas

Kansas

Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...

. Pizza Ranch is the largest regional pizza franchise in Iowa, Minnesota, and North Dakota.

History

The first restaurant was in Hull, Iowa

Hull, Iowa

Hull is a city in Sioux County, Iowa, United States. The population was 1,960 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Hull is located at .According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , all of it land....

. Pizza Ranch has grown over the years and now has franchises in ten states. Pizza Ranch's specialty is their pizza, and chicken. Their headquarters, formerly located in Hull, Iowa

Hull, Iowa

Hull is a city in Sioux County, Iowa, United States. The population was 1,960 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Hull is located at .According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , all of it land....

 are currently located in Orange City, Iowa

Orange City, Iowa

As of the census of 2000, there were 5,582 people, 1,719 households, and 1,285 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,808.5 people per square mile . There were 1,805 housing units at an average density of 584.8 per square mile...

.

Pizza Ranch is a Christian

Christian

A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...

based company. This can be seen on their mission/vision posters in their restaurants and on their website. The Pizza Ranch vision is "To glorify God by positively impacting the world we live in."

Menu

Customers have two options; ordering off the menu or (at designated times) eating from the buffet.

The menu features standard pizzeria items: Cheesy Ranch Stix, various options of pizza (including specialities like Texan taco, round up, bronco, and bacon cheeseburger), cactus bread(dessert pizza) and Buffalo wings. Pizza Ranch also offers a salad bar, as well as "Crispy Ranch Chicken" (the company's own recipe for broasted chicken), several wraps, broasted potatoes, chicken fingers, waffle fries, ranch chips, and mashed potatoes and gravy (in some locations). The buffet features the above mentioned items, and may include local specialties daily.