Dairy Queen (DQ) is an American chain of soft serve ice cream and fast-food restaurants owned by International Dairy Queen, Inc., a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway. International Dairy Queen, Inc., also owns Orange Julius, and formerly owned Karmelkorn and Golden Skillet Fried Chicken.
The first DQ restaurant was located in Joliet, Illinois. It was operated by Sherb Noble and opened for business on June 22, 1940. It served a variety of frozen products, such as soft serve ice cream.
The company’s products expanded to include malts and milkshakes in 1950, banana splits in 1951, Dilly Bars in 1955 (introduced to the franchise by Robert Litherland, the co-owner of a store in Moorhead, Minnesota), Mr. Misty slush treats in 1961 (later renamed Misty Slush, then again to Arctic Rush; as of 2017, DQ again calls them Misty Slush, as seen on dairyqueen.com), Jets, Curly Tops, Freezes in 1964, and a range of hamburgers and other cooked foods under the Brazier banner in 1958. In 1971, the Peanut Buster Parfait, consisting of peanuts, hot fudge, and vanilla soft serve, was introduced by Forrest ‘Frosty’ Chapman in his St. Peter, Minnesota Franchise. In 1990, the Breeze was launched, like a Blizzard but was made with non-fat, cholesterol-free yogurt. This was pulled of stores in 2000. In 1995, the Chicken Strip Basket was introduced, consisting of chicken strips, Texas toast (only in the US), fries, and cream gravy (gravy in Canada). Other items include sundaes and the blended coffee drink, the MooLatte.
The majority of Dairy Queen locations serve Pepsi-Cola products, but unlike most other restaurants such contracts are not mandated onto the franchisee, and as a result, some locations serve Coca-Cola products instead. Wendy’s (until 1998), Subway (until 2003), Arby’s (until 2006; returned to Coke in 2018), IHOP (until 2012), and Applebee’s (until 2012) also allowed such leniency on beverage choice before signing exclusive soft drink deals with Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola, making Dairy Queen the last major restaurant chain without an exclusive soft drink contract until 2015 when all DQ stores switched to Coca-Cola.
