Little Chef (Puffin Cafe), Penmaenmawr

The Penmaenmawr branch was a former Little Chef restaurant situated on the A55. The site originally opened in 1967 as part of the Orme View service station near the North Wales coast, just outside Colwyn Bay and Llandudno. It was the sixteenth Little Chef to open out of the first twenty-five and operated under Trusthouse. The building itself was an early prefabricated Little Chef structure dating from the 1960s.

The restaurant traded for over 35 years before closing in early 2007 as part of the sale to RCapital. A proposed Travelodge for the site was abandoned, as were earlier plans by LSP Motors to build a motel.

In July 2014, after a full refurbishment, the building reopened as the Puffin farm shop and café—named after the nearby roundabout. The original Little Chef car park was retained, even keeping its distinctive “Mini Milk” lights.

Interestingly, until 2012 a partially intact Little Chef signpost remained near the exit, showing the next branch as being 10 miles away in Bangor. It displayed both Little Chef branding and that of the on-site Burger King and Travelodge.

The Puffin closed in 2016, citing reduced trade due to roadworks, though the farm shop later reopened in 2017. Around the same time, the adjacent A55 bus stop was removed, and a Revolution self-service launderette was added to the car park in 2018.

In 2019, the Shell filling station on the site closed briefly for refurbishment, including raising the canopy height from 4.3 m to 4.6 m to accommodate HGVs. It reopened later that year.

The Puffin closed permanently in November 2019, and the building has remained derelict ever since. Despite this, much of its signage—including the large Puffin figure, intact window displays, and directional signs pointing to the car park—still remains, giving the impression that the business is merely dormant. The self-service launderette was also removed after just over a year, unlike many others in the UK that continue to operate.