BENZIE COUNTY — The Cherry Bowl Drive-In, a Northern Michigan staple since the 1950s, is closing out its first season under new ownership after a strong summer.
Mindi Jarmen and her husband bought the property in 2024, easing community concerns when the longtime venue went up for sale.
Jarmen said the first season “went great,” calling the purchase “the best choice we’ve ever made.”
“It has been absolutely a joy every single day,” Jarmen said, noting the learning curve that came with operating the theater. “We definitely missed ordering things or ordered too much of things. There was one day when we weren’t sure that the movie was going to arrive in time, or we had to learn how to ingest the movies and put them into our camera. There was so much that happened. There were so many new things. But now that we are nearing the end of our season, we’ve really come into a groove.”
Jarmen said she wanted to maintain the drive-in’s 1950s nostalgia.
“It’s the 1950s, it’s nostalgic, and I can’t imagine changing it because it is a step in the past and it’s a blast from the past,” she said.
Jarmen tells us the Cherry Bowl was the highest-grossing drive-in theater in Michigan this summer, drawing between 50 and 200 vehicles each night.
While adding more screens could bring more movies, Jarmen said she values the single-screen experience.
“I love having one screen,” she said. “It doesn’t matter what’s on the screen. It doesn’t matter what’s playing. You’re just here for all of the experiences and the fun that is here.”
Jarmen plans to expand community events and food offerings in the future.
This summer’s events included Dog Days of Summer, a pickle fest and a luau, with a car show planned for next Friday.
This weekend, the theater will host a double creature feature with “Squatch,” a Michigan-made horror film that premiered at the drive-in in June, and the 1994 horror movie “Mosquito.”