77-year-old convenience store chain closing all its stores after sale | Official Website of Louis Velazquez, entrepreneur, finance guy and tech innovator

Earlier this year, the famed Kum and Go brand disappeared from the world of convenience stores, even though its former owner thought that wasn’t the plan.

When former Kum & Go CEO Kyle Krause and his family made the deal to sell their chain to Maverik, they had been led to believe that their iconic brand name would be kept.

During the talks to sell the chain, Maverik “communicated to me that they intended to run both brands,” Krause told the Des Moines Register.

That was not what happened, as Maverik spent the 18 months after the deal closed taking the Kum & Go brand off its stores and replacing it with its own branding. Nothing in the contract prevented that from happening, but Krause, whose father founded the Kum & Go Brand in 1959, did not expect it to happen.

“It’s their decision,” Krause told the newspaper of Maverik’s decision to get rid of Kum & Go. “They can choose what they do… But certainly talking to them, their intent prior to the sale was to maintain both brands.”

Now, without as much fanfare or nostalgia, due to the nature of the brand, another convenience store chain name will soon disappear.

Freedom Oil sells its convenience store chain

Although it’s certainly not as well-known as bigger chains like Wawa or Sheetz, Freedom Oil has a deep history and made its mark on parts of the United States.

“Freedom Oil was founded in 1948 and grew from a few neighborhood stores into a network of 27 locations throughout Illinois and Florida. The sale was a bittersweet moment remembering the journey as to how the company had grown from a couple of convenience stores to its present-day level,” said third-generation family member Mike Owens in a press release.

The Owens family on Dec. 9 closed on the sale of its 27-store chain to Mizpah Ventures LLC, a Chicago-based company that operates convenience stores and fuel wholesale businesses in Illinois and Wisconsin, according to Owens, who had served as the president of his family’s business.

All of the chain’s stores will close, drop the Freedom Oil branding, and be reopened under the Mizpah name.

Terry Monroe, president of American Business Brokers & Advisors, based in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., and Bill Fecht of WJF Services Inc., based in Normal, Ill., provided merger and acquisition advisory services to Freedom Oil.

Those services included valuation advisory, marketing the business through a confidential process, and negotiation of the transaction.

Mizpah Ventures has acquired 27 Freedom Oil convenience stores.

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Smaller convenience store chains face challenges

While Kum & Go had about 400 locations when it was sold and closed, a number of smaller convenience stores have changed hands. In 2024, Tri Star Energy acquired Cox Oil, Offen Petroleum purchased Douglass Distributing, and Par Mar Oil bought Santmyer Companies.

“There still remains a large number of chains out there in the 10 to 100 store range that, depending on what their long-term strategy is — especially if they’re family-owned businesses — may decide that they want to get out,” Rob Gallo, chief strategy officer for c-store consultancy Impact 21, told CStoreDive.

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And while many of these companies have been in the same family for multiple years, the operating challenges have increased.

“It’s just more difficult to manage the chain if you’re a small operator compared to the big guys, especially with the consolidation going on across the country and in many cases, in their backyards,” Jesse Betzner, senior director for Capstone Partners, an investment banking and M&A advisory firm, told CStoreDive.

Convenience store mergers are increasing

“The pace of merger and acquisition activity in the U.S. convenience store sector is accelerating, with recent trends suggesting the nation’s c-store landscape is ripe for more change. While most of the transactions in 2024 involved smaller chains or single-store operators, several larger operators inked deals to significantly expand their footprints into new regions,” according to a report from CoBank.

The convenience store market remains heavily fragmented and widely dispersed, which lends itself to additional consolidation.

The U.S. had 152,396 convenience stores in 2024, a 1.5% year-over-year increase, according to data from the National Association of Convenience Stores.
Only 22 c-store chains in the U.S. have more than 400 locations, while roughly 96,000 have 10 or fewer.
The majority of the sector – 63% – is comprised of single-store operators.
“The vast number of single-unit operators alone points to opportunities for larger chains to expand their relationships or acquire new properties to maximize efficiencies across supply chains and distribution networks,” CoBank Economist Billy Roberts explained.
Data from Capstone Partners indicates 80% of deals completed in 2023 were for target companies of less than 50 stores.
Through September of 2024, 74% of the transactions involved smaller c-store entities.

“The biggest potential deal that could shake up the market even further puts 7-Eleven’s 13,000 U.S. locations on the table, along with its market-leading position. While 7-Eleven recently announced plans to open 1,300 new stores in North America through 2030, it has been an acquisition target itself lately. Canada-based Alimentation Couche-Tard recently attempted to purchase 7-Eleven owner Seven & i Holdings for nearly $40 billion,” according to CoBank.