(One of those chains was Indiana-based Bigfoot, where Hannasch worked at the time.) In 2003 came the deal that made Couche-Tard a major U.S. The company then turned its attention south, cannily purchasing a few operations in the Midwest, where competition was lighter than in the Northeast. Bouchard gradually expanded in Quebec, culminating with the 1997 acquisition of Provi-Soir, whose winking-owl logo Couche-Tard adopted. M&A quickly became part of Couche-Tard’s MO. He later worked at Provi-Soir, then the biggest Quebec chain, before striking out on his own in 1980, with his first Couche-Tard store. Alain Bouchard, a native of Quebec’s remote Saguenay region, got his first c-store job as a preteen in the 1960s, helping his brother operate a location of a retailer called Perrette. There, they’re called dépanneurs, from dépanner, to get someone out of a bind. Quebec has its own bustling convenience store culture. But the country is full of smaller chains that are ripe for takeovers and of hard-pressed energy companies eager to divest from gas-station retail-dynamics that should help Couche-Tard keep climbing the U.S. It was Seven & I that snared Speedway, for $21 billion, far more than Couche-Tard has ever spent on an acquisition. market: Couche-Tard’s Circle K, with 5.7%, and 7- Eleven (owned by Japan’s Seven & I Holdings), with 10.7%.

According to Euromonitor International, only two c-store brands command more than 5% of the U.S. Whichever strategies pay off, Couche-Tard has room to grow in a fragmented North American landscape. “Couche-Tard is attracting a customer into their stores who’s not necessarily going in to fill up their gas tank,” says Derek Dley, an analyst at Canaccord Genuity. In Canada, where recreational marijuana use is legal, Couche-Tard is even exploring cannabis retail. and Canada, the company is bringing in fresher food, installing espresso machines, and stocking wines that cost up to $50 a bottle. The company posits that gas-station retail can be quality retail, with higher-margin merchandise: It doesn’t have to be day-old coffee and endless beef jerky. That has changed: The travel pullback resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic has hurt Couche-Tard’s sales, but it has also driven other chains’ values down to an affordable rangeĪt the same time, Couche-Tard is relying on food to make its existing empire more profitable. Things traded at multiples that didn’t make sense to us,” says Hannasch. Brian Hannasch, an Iowa native who became Couche-Tard’s CEO in 2014, tells Fortune that the company’s ambitions were stymied by high valuations in recent years. “They’re never looking for fixer-uppers or things that are broken,” says Moody’s senior analyst Louis Ko of Couche-Tard’s leaders.īut they are looking to keep growing. The company aims to buy well-run retailers that it can help improve, rather than acting as turnaround artists. Although that bid was unsuccessful, Couche-Tard has signaled that it’s still on the hunt.Ĭouche-Tard built this gas-station Goliath with savvy M&A-including 33 acquisitions big and small in the 2010s alone. In late July, the company reportedly made an offer to buy the 3,900-store Speedway chain from Marathon Petroleum. accounts for 70% of its revenue, and its stateside footprint could get bigger. $54 billion in sales in its 2020 fiscal year, making it Canada’s third-biggest company. Having started in 1980 as a single store, Couche-Tard (pronounced “koosh-tar,” it means “late sleeper” or “night owl” in French) now owns or licenses more than 14,500 “c-stores” in a network that spans North America and Northern Europe, with outposts in Latin America, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. stores in all-belong to Alimentation Couche-Tard, a convenience-store giant headquartered in Laval, Quebec, outside Montreal.

CST Corner Stores in Texas and the Southeast, Holiday gas stations across the Northern Tier, and above all, Circle K just about everywhere in the U.S.: These familiar brands and others-making up 7,300 U.S. It starts with the badly needed fill-up or bathroom break, then progresses to an impulse food-and-beverage buy-the jumbo soft drink, the bag of chips, maybe something more substantial like a pizza slice, whatever it takes to replenish yourself for the interstate.īut what few drivers know is that this American road-trip ritual is increasingly likely to involve a huge Canadian company. There are few rituals more American than a stop at a gas-station convenience store.

Nimble giant in canda