Berthoud’s A&W Remains a Rare One, But Now Joins the Bigger Crowd

As of the fall of 2026, Colorado has 23 A&W locations across the state. Berthoud's, about 12 miles from where one was once located in Loveland, is one of the state's rarest, but has lost a little of its "down home" charm.

Was the Berthoud A&W the Last in Colorado to Do Away with Booth Phones?

While that near 80-year-old A&W at Mountain Avenue and 8th Street has classic features, like the jukebox and Papa Bear on the roof, as of the beginning of October 2026, the phones that we used to use to order from the booths are gone.

I'd seen a photo and people talking about it, so I went to see for myself on October 15, 2026, and yes... they're gone. All that remains are the [pipes] that the wire was fed through to attach to the phones. Maybe they'll put little plastic flowers in the sockets, as a reminder of a time "gone by."

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Having been open since 1949, the Berthoud A&W could have been one of the first locations to install those phones at the booths; I bet they were very strange to see when they were first used. Decades later, they became a "retro" device: "Ooh, look! They still have these!"

Were the A&W Phones Working at All Before They Were Taken Out?

Now, I cannot tell you the last time that I, myself, placed an order using one of those phones; they may not even have really worked when it was decided to take them out instead of being things that needed cleaning all the time.