Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by storewanderer »

Man. I was sure wrong on who the buyer would be.

At least the banners will continue on. Maybe they could bring back the old logos each banner had pre-Kroger because I am guessing the Kroger 4-color fuel type logo should be removed... (then again that logo was meant to unify the 4 c-store banners and had nothing even to do with the supermarkets so maybe it is the supermarket fuel stations that should lose that logo).

I suspect part of what caused Kroger to select this buyer was the fact that they have no operations in the US and FTC approval should be easy.

Also funny this buyer is setting up HQ in Cincinnati. Kroger c-stores were, from what I understand, being run out of Dillion Division in Hutchinson, KS. I didn't think Cincinnati really did much at all with the c-stores.

Hopefully now the c-stores can enable Apple Pay since Kroger was not allowing them to. Their systems can do it, as evidenced by Circle K and Maverik who use the same exact system.
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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by SamSpade »

Think this company will inherit the 2 Utah Smith's "Express" stores or will those stay with Kroger?
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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by wnetmacman »

SamSpade wrote: February 6th, 2018, 8:39 am Think this company will inherit the 2 Utah Smith's "Express" stores or will those stay with Kroger?
Are they part of a supermarket?
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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by pseudo3d »

storewanderer wrote: February 5th, 2018, 8:19 pm Man. I was sure wrong on who the buyer would be.
I'd say the way it will shake out is that Kroger sold it to the British company just to get their hands off of it in one piece, and it will be that company to parcel out stores. Basically, what I think is that Casey's will end up buying a number of stores off of them anyway, with the others going their own way. Maybe 7-Eleven will still end up taking some Tom Thumb sites.
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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by storewanderer »

wnetmacman wrote: February 6th, 2018, 11:07 am
SamSpade wrote: February 6th, 2018, 8:39 am Think this company will inherit the 2 Utah Smith's "Express" stores or will those stay with Kroger?
Are they part of a supermarket?
The two Smiths Express are staying with Smiths. They are not physically part of a supermarket, per se, but they are attached to a supermarket location financially.

There is also a third Smiths Express in the parking lot of their Mesquite, NV Store.

Smiths has quite a few off site fuel centers (usually within eyesight of the main store) but only those two in Salt Lake City and the one in Mesquite have full walk in c-stores.
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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by jamcool »

The c-stores that Kroger is selling are a hodge-podge of sites that really couldn’t complete with the big guys. Expect Kroger to start putting “Express” stores next to their fuel centers.
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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by storewanderer »

I don't know where Kroger would put "Express" stores next to its fuel centers. Most were sandwiched into parking lots as it is. Or they were built on lots and positioned in such a way that the kiosk is the only real way to do it. They are just building a fuel center on a huge lot here down the block from an existing store in the middle of a residential neighborhood. Perfect spot for a c-store (well, there is already a pretty old/small Jacksons right across the street but I think Smiths could beat them pretty easily) but instead they have a massive canopy with 16 or 18 gas pumps and the usual little pay kiosk.

They could I suppose do a bigger building in the middle of the pumps (maybe take out a couple pumps to accomplish this) and have a small c-store in the middle, but those tend to be pretty limited c-stores and I'm not sure how much better that would be than the current kiosk set up with some exterior shelves.

So I don't see Kroger doing "Express" stores next to its fuel centers.
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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by pseudo3d »

storewanderer wrote: February 7th, 2018, 8:40 pm I don't know where Kroger would put "Express" stores next to its fuel centers. Most were sandwiched into parking lots as it is. Or they were built on lots and positioned in such a way that the kiosk is the only real way to do it. They are just building a fuel center on a huge lot here down the block from an existing store in the middle of a residential neighborhood. Perfect spot for a c-store (well, there is already a pretty old/small Jacksons right across the street but I think Smiths could beat them pretty easily) but instead they have a massive canopy with 16 or 18 gas pumps and the usual little pay kiosk.

They could I suppose do a bigger building in the middle of the pumps (maybe take out a couple pumps to accomplish this) and have a small c-store in the middle, but those tend to be pretty limited c-stores and I'm not sure how much better that would be than the current kiosk set up with some exterior shelves.

So I don't see Kroger doing "Express" stores next to its fuel centers.
Correct, I've never seen a Kroger with a convenience store gas station that wasn't inherited from another grocery store (like Albertsons) or another gas station (College Station).
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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by storewanderer »

In Mesa/Gilbert/Tempe area I drove by two freestanding Fry's Convenience Stores. Obviously, these were not sold to EG Group. One appeared to be a former Arco AM/PM in the parking lot of a Fry's Store. This was a quite nice large convenience store. The other was a combined McDonalds/Fry's Fuel so it was a much smaller store, and (probably a former Chevron) that was on the next lot over from a Fry's Store.

I wonder how many other such operations exist.

Meanwhile the EG Group has taken control of operations of the actual c-store division, and has released its plans for operations:
https://csnews.com/eg-group-reveals-str ... r-c-stores

Based on this article, I do not think EG Group has a clear understanding of what it has purchased or the US c-store market. The strategies they describe is simply not going to work with the condition, lot size, demographics, etc. of the various 30-40 year old sites in the Quik Stop and Kwik Shop divisions... these are productive c-stores but they are driven by low priced gas (which it sounds like EG Group wants to brand with major oil, so that calls into question the low price) and a reliable selection of low cost beer and tobacco, along with some discount (by c-store standards) grocery items that were Kroger brand. It will be very interesting to see how this plays out. EG Group has a cash cow on its hands in the former Kroger c-stores if they just let them run "as is." They'd be better off letting the cash cow feed some organic expansion of their "branded" and other flowery-worded described concepts in new build locations in more dense areas, rather than trying to turn the former Kroger c-stores into something they simply aren't.

I also read that the Loaf N Jug president who was based in Pueblo, CO by Kroger is "retiring" now. I guess this individual was offered a job with EG Group but in Ohio. It sounds like they are centralizing the management of the c-stores to Ohio vs. the division structure that Kroger was using... that may save them some money, but these c-store divisions are very different... and I think there is a reason why Kroger had them structured how they did.
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Re: Kroger May Sell Off Its Convenience Store Chains, Including Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb, Turkey Hill

Post by jamcool »

The only real “star” of the Kroger c-stores is Turkey Hill, which will probably be expanded under the EG ownership.
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