As Weigel’s new CEO, Douglas Yawberry is overseeing the convenience-store chain’s transition to its new commissary that will prepare food for Weigel’s stores, he told CSP.
- Weigel's is No. 84 on CSP’s 2025 Top 202 ranking of convenience store chains by store count.
The company will transition its current bakery into the new 110,000-square-foot facility in Loudon, Tennessee, and begin operations at the beginning of July, Yawberry said. The facility features a cold room for making sandwiches, salads, parfaits, puddings and more. There is also a pizza line and more proprietary products.
Food is a priority for Weigel’s, Yawberry said, and when he started in the business 18 years ago, all they had was corn dogs.
“Now it's a different story, and we continue to grow that piece of our business,” said Yawberry. “And the commissary will help us do that…We've driven food a lot in the past few years… We want to make that primary and a huge percentage of our total contribution to sales.”
The commissary will also help employees focus on customers, he said.
“[Employees] can serve our day-to-day guests that come in the store without having burdensome admin work,” said Yawberry (pictured below). “We'll have fresh deliveries to the stores every day. They'll have to put out that food, but they won't have to produce it all in store. So that'll simplify our process greatly.”
As the company streamlines operations in the stores, it's also investing in frontline employees through incentives. Last year, the chain changed its bonus program so that every store employee can earn up to an extra 50 cents per hour for every hour that they work during that quarter, and that's based off how well the store performs.
“We're trying to get everybody involved and everybody rowing in the same direction and working toward the key criteria for the company to grow. And that's been very successful for us,” he said.
Employee recognition is important to Yawberry, too. Store teams that perform well in mystery shops get to have a lunch celebration while people from the support center help with operations.
“It's been great on both sides,” he said. “One, for the recognition piece. Two, it gets our teams from the support center out there, and they're making food, running registers, cleaning stores, and they enjoy that piece, and it gives them a taste of what all of our frontline associates are out there doing.”
Weigel’s total turnover has declined 40% in the last 12 months, said Yawberry.
“We need to be a united front, and sometimes organizations get caught up where you've got a corporate office and you got people in the stores and there becomes a disconnect,” said Yawberry. “We don't want that disconnect. We want everybody involved in making our company successful, and we push very hard for them.”
Yawberry, Weigel’s former president, was promoted to CEO in May. He had been filling in for former Weigel’s CEO Kenneth McMullen since he died in 2021.
Yawberry joined Weigel’s as director of operations in 2008. He was promoted to vice president of operations in 2011 and became president and chief operating officer in 2017. During his tenure, the c-store company grew from 47 to 85 stores.
Powell, Tennessee-based Weigel’s was established in 1931 as a family business selling raw milk. It had 83 stores as of Jan. 1.
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