What This Story Is About
Dolly Parton’s legacy will live on, not just in her music, but in the business empire she built that will continue to grow even after she’s gone.
Why It Matters
A business can’t succeed without demand, and for Dolly, it’s worldwide.
What Happens Next
Dolly’s Tennessean Travel Stop plans to open more locations in the future, Dolly Parton’s SongTeller Hotel in Downtown Nashville is scheduled to open this fall and Dollywood will remain open and continue with its long-term expansion plans moving forward.
For Context
From theme parks to make up lines to cake mix, Dolly Parton’s name and image sells, but the people who work on her business ventures behind the scenes will tell you she never did it just for a check.
Catch Up
Dolly Parton dies after brief battle with cancer, according to publicist
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WSMV) – From theme parks to makeup lines to cake mix, Dolly Parton’s name and image sells, but the people who work on her business ventures behind the scenes will tell you she never did it just for a check.
“Certainly just not pasting her name on things,” said Mark Dukes, the president of Dolly’s most recent endeavor Dolly’s Tennessean Travel Stop. “She was involved from the beginning.”
Dolly’s last public appearance was at the grand opening of Dolly’s Tennessean Travel Stop, a reimagining of an existing truck stop in Cornersville, Tennessee about an hour south of Nashville.
Inside, everything is Dolly, right down to the rhinestones and lace pulled from her wardrobe department to decorate the guitar chandelier that welcomes you when you walk in.
“It has been Dolly-fied,” Dukes said. “She was a huge part of helping us think about what the story should be behind it, what the decor should be, and what the atmosphere should be, all the way down to thinking about the menu in the restaurant.”
But a business can’t succeed without demand, and for Dolly, it’s worldwide.
“I used to say that Dolly was a national treasure, but that just isn’t true,” Dukes said. “She’s an international treasure. Because after we opened our doors, I was blown away by the amount of people from Germany, from Asia, South America, Central America that were coming in and excited about her, excited about the location, about the travel stop, about the merchandise.”
Dukes chalks it up to the queen of country’s humility and grace.
“She’s genuine,” he said. “Everybody can connect with her. Whether it’s through her music or somewhere they visited or a concert they went to or where they happen to be in a restaurant where she was in a restaurant. Everybody has a Dolly story, and they’re all positive.”
It’s the same reason he says his staff are proud to be a part of something she created.
“We all feel really responsible for carrying that legacy on and providing the type of service, making people feel welcome the way she always did,” he said.
And that legacy will live on, not just in her music, but in the business empire she built that will continue to grow even after she’s gone.
Dolly’s Tennessean Travel Stop plans to open more locations in the future, Dolly Parton’s SongTeller Hotel in Downtown Nashville is scheduled to open this fall and Dollywood will remain open and continue with its long-term expansion plans moving forward.
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