Most days, Richard Gann orders the same meal at Cracker Barrel as he did 20 years ago when the restaurant and Old Country Store opened for business at the location off Ala. Highway 157.

Cracker Barrel in Cullman celebrated its 20th anniversary recently. Several long time employees, the general manager and Gann, who was one of the restaurant’s first customers, sat around a table discussing how much has changed during the past 20 years, and how much is hasn’t, staying as it was.

When the restaurant chain opened its first Cullman location, the menu was smaller, and the only business close by was a Shell Station.

Instead of being surrounded by other restaurants, fast food establishments and gas stations now clustered around the nearby Interstate 65 exit, there were large trees in close proximity.

But in spite of the changes in scenery, the restaurant and store has many customers who return every day to be served by the same staff.

“They’re not just customers, they’re more like family,” said Laura Townsend, a longtime employee at the restaurant.

Townsend said some customers eat two or three meals every day at Cracker Barrel.

“If we don’t see them for a few days, we start to worry,” she said.

Bernicea “Bernie” Gurstman started working at Cracker Barrel when the restaurant first opened its doors in Cullman. At the time, her daughter was a toddler, she said.

Gurstman recalled an ice storm in 1996 known as the “big freeze” that halted travel and closed down most area businesses except Cracker Barrel. Utility crews from Cullman and elsewhere gathered at the restaurant for a meal, she said.

General Manager Mark Norman said the Cullman Cracker Barrel is unusual in comparison to other Cracker Barrel restaurants because 60 percent of its customers are local.

In other locations, most customers are from out of town, he said. The store also has regular non-local customers who stop at Cracker Barrel on road trips.

The staff agreed the Cullman restaurant’s friendly employees are one reason the eatery is believed to be the best of the chain in Alabama. The store employs 145 to 150 people, Norman said.

During the past two decades, thousands of employees have come and gone, including seven general managers. Some staff members paid their way through college and met spouses while working at the restaurant, Townsend said.

“People know they can stop in Cullman and get quality service and food,” Townsend said. “We appreciate all our regular customers and people in Cullman for supporting us all these years.”