SAN ANGELO, Texas -- Two transactions transpired late last week that grew the respective acquiring companies' retail holdings by double digits.
Principals of Town & Country Food Stores and Shelton Oil Co. on Friday finalized a confidential agreement of acquisition between the two organizations. And in a separate deal, Armada Oil & Gas Co. completed its purchase of Barney's Convenience Stores for an undisclosed price.
Mertzon, Texas-based Shelton Oil operates bulk fuel plants, an LPG business and 11 Shot's convenience stores, [image-nocss] branded with Chevron gasoline. With this deal, Town & Country now operates 159 c-stores in West Texas and eastern New Mexico, plus seven supermarkets in various West Texas towns.
We are honored to welcome the Shelton employees to the Town & Country family, said Lloyd Norris, chairman of San Angelo, Texas-based Town & Country. We have admired the Shelton organization for many years, and we are very pleased that we have finalized a mutually beneficial agreement.
Meanwhile, Dearborn, Mich.-based petroleum distributor Armada Oil & Gas Co. completed its purchaseas reported in CSP Daily News in Julyof J.F. Enterprises Inc., Perrysburg, Ohio, which operates the 10-unit Barney's chain and a 360 Fitness gym, said The Toledo Blade.
Armada, currently with no retail units, bought the stock and all operations of J.F. Enterprises, which has been run by co-owners Marilyn Fox and Robert Richard, who serves as president, since they bought it in 1985 from Fox's father, Joseph Frank Ziemianski.
The c-store chain grew from the Big Barney Auto Wash, the area's first automated car wash, which Ziemianski opened in 1966, the report said. The company has more than 160 employees.
We had an offer we couldn't pass up, Fox told the newspaper concerning the decision to sell now.
Like every other small retailer, I used to get a call a month from somebody [who wanted to buy my stores], Richard told CSP Daily News following the announcement of the transaction. I got a call from an attorney representing Armada last April, just a few days before I was going to [the NACS State of the Industry Summit]. I was up for [NACS] chairman, and I told him, If I make chairman, I'm not selling'.
Richard didn't become chairman. A few days after he returned from the summit, he took another call from Armada, asking, Now what do you think? Richard's children had careers outside of the business, so succession was an issue. He just had to make sure his employees would be taken care of. I told [Armada] I needed this, this, this and this, he said. So I gave them my shopping list, and within a few days I said OK.
Richard also told CSP Daily News that J.F. Enterprises' vice president Roy Clark is going to lead the new Toledo division of Armada. It's going to be J.F. Enterprises Inc., division of Armada, he said, and Barney's will be the store name.
Fox told the paper that the gas stations most likely will switch from the CITGO to the BP gasoline brand.
The 10 Barney's locations are all in Ohio; J.F. Enterprises also operates four Subway restaurants and several Orion food operations, said the report. The fitness center includes a day spa and tanning facility.
Richarda member of the NACS board, a past vice chairman for its NACSPAC political action committee and board and executive committee member of the Ohio Retail Merchantsplans to retire to Colorado.
Fox told the Blade that she will remain in the Toledo area and run the Mazie Foundation, which she founded in 2000 to assist battered women and children.
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