EG Group co-founder Zuber Issa is pushing to sell the global convenience-store company’s entire U.S. business to reduce its $5.3 billion debt load, the Financial Times reported Friday. The recommendation contrasts with London-based private equity firm TDR Capital’s preference to take the company public.
Zuber Issa said selling the U.S. business is attractive because there are similar companies in the market to benchmark valuations, and a sale would lower the group’s leverage to about three times earnings, said the FT. Last year, EG’s U.S. division, EG America, generated an adjusted profit of $449 million, nearly 50% of the group’s total.
CEO Russell Colaco, however, emphasized EG’s strengths and growth prospects when he was appointed to the role in April.
“Over the past 12 months, EG Group has considerably strengthened its balance sheet and organically grown its earnings, benefiting from a resilient and diverse earnings mix,” Colaco said. “Our global scale, well-balanced estate, range of international and local specialty brands and attractive growth opportunities are compelling foundations that will underpin strong financial performance moving forward.”
Zuber Issa said there are already potential buyers for the U.S. business.
“It will be an auction process which would get to a clear end goal much quicker than an IPO, and we can pay the debt off,” he told the FT.
- EG America is No. 6 on CSP’s 2025 Top 202 ranking of U.S. c-store chains by store count.
Zuber and his brother, Mohsin Issa, co-founded EG Group in 2001 and served as co-CEOs until Zuber stepped down in connection with his purchase of U.K. assets. Mohsin Issa remained sole CEO until April, when the company appointed Colaco, its former chief financial officer, as CEO.
In November, EG Group Ltd., the parent of Westborough, Massachusetts-based EG America LLC, completed the sale of its more than 550-site U.K. convenience and fuel retail business to Zuber Issa. He still owns a 25% stake in the company and sits on the board. Mohsin Issa also owns 25% and TDR owns 50% of the business.
Mohsin Issa said that following the sale of the U.K. business, the United States is now EG’s largest market by sales and that the company needs its top leadership focused there.
“The shareholders are still thinking about the options,” Zuber Issa said. “Other options would be trying to sell the U.S. in its entirety. And I think that should be an option we should do.”
Founded in 2001 by the Issa family, Blackburn, United Kingdom-based EG Group is a gasoline forecourt and retail convenience operator with more than 6,200 sites across the United Kingdom and Ireland, Europe, the United States and Australia. In 2018, EG Group established itself in the United States as EG America by acquiring Kroger’s 762-site c-store network, which included the Turkey Hill, Loaf 'N Jug, Kwik Shop, Tom Thumb and Quik Stop banners. It acquired TravelCenters of America’s Minit Mart convenience-store business in 2018. The portfolio included 225 c-stores. And in 2019, among other acquisitions, EG Group acquired Cumberland Farms and its nearly 660 c-stores in the Northeast and Florida.
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