Tastyland plans 2nd location in former Monroeville bicycle shop

The owners of Tastyland on Route 66 north of Greensburg are nearing completion on an expansion and renovation at the longtime summer roadside attraction.

This week, they announced that expansion will include a second location in Monroeville.

“We were talking about doing a fast-casual location, something like a Chipotle or Five Guys,” said Ryan Gunniers of Penn Township, who operates Tastyland along with his mother, Jill, and brothers, Brandon and Austin.

The Gunniers family opted for the former Pro Bike+Run shop on Route 22 in Monroeville, which was heavily damaged in a May 2021 fire.

“The landlord there has been amazing to work with,” Gunniers said. “He’s gotten it all cleaned up and had engineers out to make sure everything is structurally sound. And that building has a second floor, so we were talking about what we could do with that.”

The cycle shop has reopened nearby at the corner of Route 22 and McMasters Avenue.

The original Tastyland, which the Gunniers bought in 2020, is being renovated to add a drive-thru lane, paving and decks.

“We opened for the season about 10 days ago,” Jill Gunniers said. “And because we’re so busy, we’re only going to have the drive-thru open during the cold months. We sometimes have a line of 50 people out front, so we didn’t want people trying to walk through the parking lot as well as people using the drive-thru. We’ll probably open it in the fall.”

As for the new location — which is 9,000 square feet compared with the current Tastyland’s 800 square feet — she was excited for the possibilities.

“It’s a little bit intimidating, but we’re mostly trying to do the same thing we do here,” she said. “What’s exciting is we’ve never done a bar venue before. We’re going to have a party room upstairs that people can rent, and we want it to be a really fun place for the community to get together.”

“We really like Monroeville, and we feel like they’re very encouraging to local businesses,” Ryan Gunniers said. “Plus, there’s a lot of traffic, which will give us a lot of visibility.”

The family is taking its time with the new location.

“We were at a point where we were growing fast in Greensburg but talked about needing to get to that next level,” he said. “We have some big ambitions, we love working with small businesses and collaborating, and we’re hoping to do something really special.”