The Penmaenmawr branch was a former Little Chef restaurant located on the A55.
The Little Chef first opened at a service station between 1965 and 1968 near the coast of North Wales just outside of Colwyn Bay & Llandudno. It was the sixteenth restaurant to open out of the first twenty-five, opening under the ownership of Trusthouse. The building it was housed in was an early example of a prefabricated Little Chef building - dating from the 1960s.
The Little Chef lasted for more than 35 years, finally closing in early 2007 as a part of the sale to RCapital.
The building was thoroughly refurbished and became a new farm shop and cafe known as the 'Puffin', which opened in July 2014. The original Little Chef car park remained - even retaining it's "Mini Milk" lights.
Curiously, up until around 2012/13, a Little Chef signpost had also partly remained near the exit of the services. It showed that the next Little Chef was 10 miles away in Bangor, and displayed the logos of the Little Chef and its onsite Burger King & Travelodge.
The Puffin farm shop and cafe closed in 2016, blaming roadworks for the drop in trade. However, not all was lost - as the farm shop later re-opened in 2017.
In 2019 the Shell filling station closed briefly for a remodel, adjusting the height of the canopy from 4.3m to 4.6m. It later re-opened that same year.
The Puffin farm shop closed for the second time in November 2019 - leaving the site empty again.
