Newspaper Page Text
Page 2— Wednesday, August 4, 2021, The True Citizen
Duggs Doggs says good good-bye
SHELLIE SMITLEY
thetruecitizen.shellie@gmail.com
Mike Wood’s last gig as op
erator of Duggs Doggs Good
Good! hotdog stand took place
July 31 at William Mizell Ford.
Wood’s plans are simpler
from now on. Tie’s going to
enjoy his family, watch TV
and ride his Flonda Goldwing
motorcycle.
“Be retired,” he said laugh
ing. “I’m not going to do
anything.”
Running the beloved mobile
food business turned out to be
more than Wood bargained for
in more than one way. Selling
hotdogs started out as a hobby
in 2009 that he expected to
pursue once-a-month. The
hobby snowballed into a two to
three days-per-week venture.
“It just got bigger and bigger
and bigger,” he said. “I started
doing catering and I have fed
just about everyone in Burke
County for the last 12 years.”
Wood built up quite a fol
lowing. He once fed 1,000
people in an hour. He main
tained a list of approximately
200 people who requested that
they be notified of where he set
up his cart.
“It got to the point, where if
I didn’t go out and somebody
saw me, they would ask me
‘why didn’t you go out, where
have you been, we drove all
over town looking for you,”’
he said laughing.
In 2011, Wood started a
tip jar. Over the years, he
has donated $10,000 in tip
money to Forces United, a lo
cal organization that connects
service members, veterans and
their families, from all eras,
wounded or not, to programs
and resources that mitigate
crisis and improve and em
power them to prosper in the
community.
Wood is a retired veteran of
the U.S. Army and served in
Iraq during Desert Shield and
Desert Storm. He is as pas
sionate about children as he is
about vets.
“The best tip I ever got was
eight cents,” Wood said. “I was
at Boss Hogg and this little boy,
about 7 years old, took his little
wallet out of his pocket and
opened the little change purse
and put eight cents in the tip jar.
No parents were around and
nobody told him what to do,
and it about got to me.”
Children are the reason he
stayed in the business as long
as he did, he said. He pointed
to a recent experience as an
example of how much the chil
dren touched his heart. While
set up at the Pineland Bakery
July 27, a child asked him if he
was going to continue to sell
hotdogs at his school. Wood
explained that he was retiring.
Creating one last memory for
a school-aged child, Wood ah
lowed the child and his sister to
walk into his trailer and press
the button on a mechanical
hotdog, enabling it to talk.
“Every time I did an event
at a school or church, the kids
would come out and pick out
their drink and their chips and
tell me what they wanted on
their hotdog and then they
would get to push the button
on the hotdog,” he said. “That
tickled me to death and that’s
why I kept doing it.”
Still, Wood credits Burke
County businesses with his
success.
“I could not have done it
without them,” he said. “If
I tried to thank everybody,
I would have to name every
business in Burke County.”
Wood named the business af
ter his brother-in-law with spe
cial needs. The good-good part
came because that is what he
said every time Wood brought
him a coke.
“Mike’s hotdogs just didn’t
sound good, it didn’t have a
ring,” Wood joked.
People have reached out to
him, interested in purchasing
his equipment. He is willing
to sell it, but the name is not
up for sale.
“That is going to be retired,
because I own all the rights to
it,” he said sincerely. “There
will never be another Duggs
Doggs, never again. It’s been a
good ride, and I have enjoyed
it. It has definitely been good
good.”
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