PHILADELPHIA — It’s a small Wawa, after all. Wawa Inc. held the grand opening of its newest convenience store—its smallest—in Philadelphia on Jan. 10, which featured the debut of a new design that includes a pickup window.
At 3,000 square feet, half the size of a standard Wawa store, the new location offers:
- A pickup window for mobile orders and online ordering to expedite service.
- A new Good to Go line of expanded hot and cold express items.
- New products such as a self-serve hot tea bar featuring Revolution Tea.
The store also will aim to reduce its environmental footprint by introducing compostable straws, reusable bags and an option to purchase a usable mug for coffee or hot beverages.
“At Wawa, we strive to accommodate our customers in multiple ways, and this new store design is geared toward meeting the needs of our local community members who require quick food options without sacrificing fresh and quality ingredients to fuel their daily routine,” said David Simonetti, senior director of store operations for Wawa.
The store opened to the public with free T-shirts, free coffee (through Jan. 13) and a ribbon-cutting ceremony that included General Manager Christopher Marvel, Area Manager Ron Christensen, Director of Store Operations Becky Altemus, plus Simonetti and Wawa mascot Wally Goose.
City officials and Wawa Welcome America leadership joined the festivities to celebrate the retailer’s longstanding title sponsorship of the annual Wawa Welcome America Festival celebrating Independence Day and to publicly announce the chain’s commitment as title sponsor of the annual festival through 2024.
And in a continuing effort to reduce the homeless street population in Philadelphia, Wawa has joined forces with other founding members its support of PHL Cares, an initiative aimed at providing permanent supportive housing units for 100 homeless people.
Also, to honor the bravery of everyday heroes, the grand opening event concluded with a Hoagies for Heroes sandwich-building competition. Teams from Philadelphia Police Department and Philadelphia Fire Department faced off to build the most hoagies in three minutes. Wawa presented checks on behalf of the teams for $1,000 to the charities of their choice.
Wawa, Pa.-based Wawa has more than 880 c-stores, approximately 600 of which offer fuel, in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Florida and Washington, D.C. It is No. 9 in CSP’s2019 Top 202 ranking of c-store chains by number of company-owned retail outlets.
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