Hills Snack Bar

We're here, hope to see many of yinz soon!

The overnight storms have cleared out and it’s a perfect day to come on over to the brewery! We are opening early because Hills Snack Bar is here at 11 with all the classics! Then, Mediterranean Tastes LLC has great food for you and all your peeps. Finally, it’s the brewery debut of Pierce Dipner Band from 7 to 10. The taps are ready to pour your favorite brews!

Today a sticker was added to our window, the Allegheny County Health Department's seal of approval. We are now permitted in Allegheny County. If you've inquired with us previously for an Allegheny Co. event appearance, we will be following up soon (or feel free to revive any old messages and/or email chains as a reminder.) Any new Allegheny County requests may be emailed to: [email protected] (please include as much info as possible, including proposed date/time, address, if electricity is available, etc...)

Thank you all, hope to see many of yinz at an event this season.

"Thank You!" to everyone who came and saw us today at our season opening event in Jeanette PA. And thanks again to Grandma's Country Oven Bake Shoppe for having us.

And perhaps most importantly, a big THANK YOU to all the kids who submitted their colored-in Hills Easter artwork. Here's a few examples of what they submitted. :)

A big special thanks to one of our followers Jennifer Lynn. She wanted us to have this Hills original "UnBearably Delicious Cookbook". We will proudly display this at the Hills Snack Bar during our outings!

I wonder if our friends at KDKA-TV | CBS Pittsburgh remember their submissions???

Check out Ken Rice 's "Low Maintenance Lasagna"
Or how about Jennifer Antkowiak 's "Pasta Sauce"

And we hope the all-grown-up Rachel Marion is following us, we'd love to hear if she remembers her childhood drawing from when she was 9 😁

Hello Hills Snack Bar Fans.

We are currently planning our 2024 schedule of events, and will be posting these under our "events" tab as the dates, times, and locations are confirmed.

If you are an event planner, or business owner and would like to host the Hills Snack Bar at your event or place of business, you may send us an email to: [email protected] (please please please, no emails with general suggestions like "please come to (insert town here)...as these types of emails simply clog up our inbox, but you may feel free to comment general suggestions here or to any of our posts as frequently as you'd like :)

When emailing with an appearance request, please include as much information as possible, including event date/time and address location, expected estimated attendance, if its a private event or open to the public, and if electricity could be provided (240 volt 50 amp plug would be ideal but not required, as having an electric hookup allows us to bypass using our generators and saves the crowd from such generator noise).

Thank you all for your continued support and we hope to see many of you at an event this year!

Wishing all our followers a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. We hope to see many of you during our 2024 outings!!!

A huge "Special Thanks" to David Curran of, Curran Taylor, Inc for this "original" Hills popcorn warmer/display. Mr. Curran's company used to supply most (perhaps all) of the original Hills' with their needed snack bar equipment, and this piece in particular he kept stored away for some 25 years.

We're hoping to find room for it in our mobile Hills Snack Bar, so that we may continue our quest to make this as close to an authentic experience as we can.

Thanks again Dave!

I would just like to take a moment to create a F.A.Q. list, which we'll use to link people to as needed.

Q. When and where is your next scheduled event?
A. Please refer to the "Events" tab on our page, which we will keep updated with our schedule as dates and locations are added.

Q. When will you be in (insert any city/town/state here)?
A. We simply don't know, until we're booked there. We want to try to offer a diverse schedule that sees us traveling to as many locations as possible, so that we can serve and interact with as many of our followers as possible, so for now the best we can say is, please stay tuned to our events page, and hopefully an event near you will pop up on our schedule.

Q. What is on your menu?
A. We offer many of the key items from the original Hills offerings, including: Hotdogs, Soft Pretzels, Nachos, Popcorn, Candied Nuts, Assorted Chips, Assorted canned/bottled drinks, and ICEEs.

Q. How may we book you for an event?
A. Please email us at [email protected], and please include as much information as possible, such as: date/time of the proposed event, address of event location (include County please), estimated number of guests, public or private event, is water/electricity available (not "required", but having either or both is helpful), any events fees, etc... ((((NOTE: we are booked out for the 2023 season, if you'd like to consider us for 2024 please email us with the details))))

Q. Could I buy a T-shirt from you?
A. Yes, at one of our events. We are not set up for mail order T-shirt sales at this time, but we are working with an apparel company to make that possible, we will provide that information asap once our apparel has been added to their online store.

"Thank you" to everyone who came to our grand opening today. I wish it was a little more "grand" as we got off to a rough start with our generator issues,...then we learned our ICEE machine does not like constant use, it simply can't keep up with demand. We're going to have to work with the ICEE company to solve that issue, as we can't be telling customers our machine is out. So if you didn't get your ICEE today, we sincerely apologize!!!

We hope to work through these issues and get back on track very soon. And for those that left feeling disappointed, believe us, we felt that as well. We thought we were "set to go" after having a successful soft opening, but it appears we may have some growing pains to sort through yet.

We're obviously hoping that these issues are resolved before any future scheduled events, but we may have to work with some of the event planners on a new date. We'll update any effected Events accordingly.

Again, THANK YOU for supporting us. Despite these hiccups it was a pleasure to serve you all today!!!

Edit - I don wanna jinx us, but it looks like we're back up to full speed, ICEE's and pretzels are back!

To those considering coming to our opening event today, you may want to reconsider.

We're having some opening day blues, our generators are not cooperating and we do not have shore-power from the dealer.

We are basically limited to hotdogs and popcorn only and bottled/canned drinks. Pretzels and ICEE's are down.

We are so sorry, this is obviously quite embarrassing, we thought we had our bugs worked out during our soft opening.

Thank you to those who did show up and are still hanging in line despite these issues.

Even more GOOD NEWS, this time for our neighbors in WV!

Today we learned that the WV dept of health can and will issue temporary food vendor permits to out of state food trucks, provided the permit is applied for within 30 days of the proposed event. We will then be subject to an inspection the day of the event, but we're more than confident we will pass!

That said, we would love to coordinate an event with someone at/near a city or town in WV close to an original Hills location, where the love for Hills is still strong.

Any WV event coordinators are welcome to email us at [email protected] with requests, please include the County so that we may apply for their temporary permit.

GOOD NEWS for our neighbors in OH!

Today I spoke with the OH health dept, and was informed that OH can and will issue temporary food vendor permits to out of state food trucks, provided the permit is applied for within 7 days of the proposed event. We will then be subject to an inspection the day of the event, but we're more than confident we will pass!

That said, we would love to coordinate an event with someone at/near a city or town in OH close to an original Hills location, where the love for Hills is still strong.

Any OH event coordinators are welcome to email us at [email protected] with requests, please include the County so that we may apply for their temporary permit.

We hope other states have a similar temporary permitting process, as we'd love to tour other neighboring states as well (checking soon, and will post more information once known)!!!!

To all the folks who have sent us direct messages with event/appearance requests via FaceBook messenger: Firstly, thank you, secondly I apologize if you've not yet received a response. Please understand that we've been absolutely overwhelmed with requests for bookings and appearances, and we're trying to go through each request to arrange a locationally diverse schedule.

If you've sent a message, but have not received a response, but feel that the Hills Snack Bar would be a great fit for your event, please email us at [email protected] with your event details.

Please include: date/time/exact location (physical address). Please note, we are NOT able to accept any events outside of PA at this time, (OH and WV being the only exception), we are only licensed and insured to operate in PA, but we can obtain a temporary permit for OH and WV. No Allegheny County PA requests at this time, although we are PA state certified, Allegheny County does not recognize the state permit, as they have their own health dept above and beyond the state level, and we've not yet obtained their certification (we'll post an update when any out of state permits and/or Allegheny County permit(s)have been received).

Please include as much event details as possible, such as estimated number of attendees, any utilities available such as water/electricity (these are not "required" but if available it does allow things to run more smoothly especially if electricity is provided, as the crowd doesn't have to hear our generators.)

And lastly, I understand people are very excited about what we're doing, and want to see us succeed, and want to offer location/event suggestions, and we appreciate all of the positive vibes, we really do;....but please refrain from sending us general suggestions via messenger or email at this time (we encourage you to simply post comments under anything we post until your hearts content but we're trying very hard to manage our direct messages/emails with "serious inquires only"). Direct messages of "I bet you'd do well at the festival at such and such" or "We would love to see you at the _____ event" or "you should try to get into the so and so show" are just adding to our backlog. Again we understand your heart may be in the right place and you're anxious to see us pop-up near you, but those types of messages just add to our already voluminous pile that we're trying to diligently work through.

Thank you,
Hills Snack Bar

Dear Hills Snack Bar followers:

The moment alot of yinz have been waiting for, (us included), is finally here....

We are happy to announce the details of our Grand Opening Celebration!!!!

It will be this Saturday, July 15th, at the Green Garden Plaza in Aliquippa PA, home of the former "Hills #28" store!!!!....a.k.a. "our old Hills".

We will be setup at the Miller and Son's Chevrolet Dealer which is directly across the parking lot of the former Hills store (now Big Lots).

Attached is the exact address, and an aerial view photo (we'll be within the blue circle, former Hills is marked in red for reference).

This will be a "lunch-time" event, we plan to open our windows at noon, and serve until the dealership closes, which will be 3pm (PLEASE be in-line by 2:30pm, as we will rope off our service line at that time, to finish serving the final guests until 3).

Thanks again for all the support and encouragement to get us here, we hope to see you all there!

Link to "Facebook Events":

https://fb.me/e/16w316dOy?mibextid=Gg3lNB

Today, the Hills Snack Bar made its first public appearance. We had our "soft opening" at Independence Township's "Independence Day of Celebration" in Beaver County PA. If you're wondering why this wasn't announced in advance, well, it's because we wanted to get our feet wet with a low-key event, work out any kinks (which there were a few), and not be overwhelmed with a huge crowd for our first outing.

Overall, I would say the event was a success! Lots of Hills memories were shared, and it was great to see the people taking somewhat of a "walk down memory lane" while they enjoyed the "snacks" they putchased from us. Thank you all who showed up tonight, but a big special thanks to our FIRST CUSTOMER EVER...."Justin" (blue shirt below)...who bought himself an ICEE drink!

We will be posting details of future events shortly, including our grand opening celebration which will be occurring soon.

Best regards from the Hills Snack Bar team!

Today was a very exciting day! A moment we've been anticipating for a while,....we had our Department of Agriculture "Health Inspection" and we are pleased to finally announce that we are Certified to operate!!!!

We will be posting our Grand Opening details soon, as well as all future event dates/times/locations as our calendar fills up.

Thank you all so very much for your patience, we hope to see you all at an event near you!!!!

Edit - Allegheny County has informed us that they have their own separate Health Dept, in addition to the PA dept of Agriculture. That said, we will not be setting up in Allegheny County in the foreseeable future until we obtain approval from their health dept as well. Please stay tuned for our schedule which will include dates in Beaver County, and other PA counties which accept the State's Dept of Agriculture approval.

We recently received some samples from Hippey's meats, they make premium Hotdogs (among other quality meats). What a great way to test our Nemco Hotdog roller. Special thanks to Jen Wagner of Hippey meats for the samples, we look forward to offering these delicious Hotdogs to our customers!

One step closer....

Today the good guys at ICEE came and setup our ICEE machine.

A huge "Special Thanks" to my neighbor, friend, and former Hills employee (you know who you are 😉), for providing us with this list of former Hills locations.

Here's a few example pages from what is a list of 200+ Hills locations,....hopefully we can revist most/all of these communities with the Hills Snack Bar!

Edit - sorry if you don't see "your Hills" on here, these are just a few example pages amongst the dozen or so or double sided pages I was given,... chances are your Hills is here :)

Had a meeting with Gold Metal Concession today, they were a supplier to the original Hills Snack Bar, so we're happy to partner with them again for some of our menu items. Thanks again Gold Metal for the product samples.

T-Shirts are in! As promised in our "1000 followers" post, we would like to give one to 3 lucky followers. These were more or less a test-run, so sizes and colors are limited for now, but we 'should' have 'most' sizes from Small to XXL in both red and white.

To win, simply like and share our page, and comment your favorite original Hills Snack Bar menu item below,... then tomorrow at 10:30am, I will turn comments off, and have a random comment picker select 3 winners. I'll then post the winners, and send a message requesting your shipping address.

Cheers!!!!

Edit - Thank you to everyone who participated in this T-shirt giveaway. At this time I'll be closing comments so that I may use the random comment picker tool to select the winners. Stay tuned, I'll be posting the winners shortly.

2nd Edit - winners have been chosen, thank you all for participating, winners may reach out via a direct message anytime, or I will message you after I've scrolled through to find you.

Final edit - Messages were sent to all winners, please reply with your mailing address and they will be sent to you asap, thanks again.

Hello Hills Snack Bar followers.

If you get WTAE channel 4 news (local news station based out of Pittsburgh PA), please consider tuning in tonight at 6pm as they will be running a short story on the Hills Snack Bar .

But please, cut me some slack, I've never been on camera before, LOL,...regardless, this whole thing isn't about me, it's about the Hills Snack Bar, and you the people and the communities it will serve, and all the fond memories that we all hold near and dear to our hearts.

Thanks again for your support!!!

Thank you all who have liked and followed our page. It is obvious the love for the Hills Snack Bar is strong, and we look forward to hopefully seeing each and every one of you at an event in 2023.

We are very close to having 1000 followers, and once we reach that number, we plan to do a free giveaway with shipping included of a few "Hills Snack Bar" T-shirts, (I'm thinking we'll either use a random comment picker app to select a few winners, or perhaps simply give them to the first 3 people who respond to our next T-shirt post,...any ideas on how to make that giveaway fair are certainly welcome)...stay tuned.

Thanks again folks.

Sincerely,
Hills Snack Bar.

A special "THANK YOU!" to the one and only Pittsburgh Dad for liking and following our page. We would like to extend "dad" a personal invitation to attend the Hills Snack Bar grand re-opening in the spring of 2023. We will send an email to your team when all the details are planned and finalized.

There's been some naysayers questioning what's actually going on here, please allow me to clarify.

The "Hills Department Store" chain will continue to be a memory that we all cherish. No reopening of any physical store fronts as we remember will take place.

However, what we are doing is, revitalizing what many argue to be the best part of Hills,...the Snack Bar!

It will be a rolling/mobile unit taken to many events and neighborhoods where former Hills locations used to be. We plan to post our menu (which will include all the classics) and dates/locations in early 2023.

Thank you all for liking and following the Hills Snack Bar page, we plan to keep you updated with all future developments.

From the ashes Hills will rise...

It's been some 23 years since folks have been able enjoy a snack from the Hills Snack Bar,...in 2023 the wait will be over.