Pretzel Boy’s is opening its fourth St. Louis-area location in O’Fallon, Missouri, this spring

We’re in a twist, but a good one. In a couple of weeks, there’ll be another place to get Pretzel Boy’s pretzels when a fourth location opens at 2699 Highway K in O’Fallon, Missouri. While this store will be owned and operated by Beth and James Tesson, Tim Garvey – the business’ original founder – will assume a more parental role as ongoing consultant.

Garvey is definitely the right man for this job: Pretzels are in his bones. Not only does his father hail from Philadelphia, but he got an early start in the business as a college-age student selling Gus’s Pretzels, peanuts and bottled drinks outside Busch Stadium on game days. One stall became four stalls (one at each “corner”) became a post-college stint in Philadelphia where he was taught the ins and outs (and twists and turns) of pretzel-making by notable baker, Tim Dever.

By then, Garvey had a degree in finance and economics from Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama. He returned to St. Louis, and was just 22 when he opened the first store on Manchester Road in Des Peres in 2011. The Sunset Hills location opened on South Lindbergh in 2015; then the Southampton shop on South Hampton Avenue was launched in 2018. Garvey co-owns those stores with his brother Matt Garvey and his wife Jamie Garvey. All in all, he considers that he’s been in the pretzel business for 17 years, and has eaten (we had to ask) “thousands of the things.”

The O’Fallon location will have a few seats at a small bar, but Garvey said this will be a grab-and-go situation. In addition to classic soft pretzels, Pretzel Boy’s does a fine line in pretzel-wrapped meats, as well as nuggets with different sauces; and fun, doughy gimmicks like shamrocks, footballs, grad caps et cetera.