BELLEVILLE, Ill. -- The winner of 2006's CSP Outlook Award for Customer Service plans to spread that cheer around the Midwest in the next 10 years.
MotoMart Convenience Stores, based in Belleville, Ill., owned by Moto Inc., and operated by FKG Oil Co., will be adding to its collection of 70 rural and small-city stores and gas stations across six states.
Its intention to build 40 stores in the next decade will take concrete form in June, when ground is broken in Appleton, Wis., for a 4,200-square-foot store and 8 to 10 multi-pump [image-nocss] dispensers. Director of real estate development Brian Pendleton said the project has a 120-day construction window.
Pendleton, who held the same position when he recently ended a 15-year career at QuikTrip, Tulsa, Okla., said all new stores will be similarly sized. The purchase of a handful of 4,000-square-foot locations from a competitor a few years ago showed MotoMartwith store sizes ranging from kiosk to 4,000 feetthe benefits of that size, Pendleton said.
About the size of many c-store companies that choose to sell rather than expand, MotoMart chose the latter. The difference from the existing stores in the look of the new stores, said Pendleton, will be night and day. He said the strongest-performing existing stores will be remodeled, but he emphasized that does not mean there will be any divesting of flat or under-performing locations.
You either grow or die, Pendleton said.
Pendleton said expansion will be focused on a 250-mile range from headquarters near St. Louis. The chain buys its fuel on the spot market and has car washes in two locations in Ohio, five in Missouri, one in Indiana and five in Illinois. Its prepared-food offerings include three McDonald's in Missouri and one in Minnesota, a Subway in Illinois, and a proprietary program named Hero's Pizza and Subs, which is in three stores in Illinois, two in Missouri, and one in Ohio.
Pendleton said MotoMart will be testing E85 at a St. Louis-area location.
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