"We've chosen to grow a brand in the middle of a recession," Cary Knuth, general manager of Chevron America's Products West, told CSP Daily News in an exclusive interview. "That's not done very often."
Not that the recession hasn't taken its toll. In 2009, the company added just over 100 new franchisees to it roll, but thing slowed [image-nocss] down in 2010, when about 50 new franchisee sites were added.
But for next year, Knuth, chatting with CSP from the Sherwood Country Club in Thousand Oaks, Calif., site of the 2010 Chevron World Challenge PGA golf tournament, is optimistic the company can get back on that 2009 growth track.
"We think we can get back to that 100 count," he said, noting that increase would get the Chevron, San Ramon, Calif., about three-quarters of way to its goal of having 400 franchised ExtraMile sites.
"Right now we're up to almost 500 ExtraMiles. About 290 of those are company-operated, and about 190 are retailer-owned stores," he said. "Our objective is to grow that retailer-owned number up to 400-plus."
Most of those sites are in three states, California, Oregon and Washington, with a few in Florida.
But that 400-store goal just a first step in Chevron's growth strategy, which puts an emphasis on manageable growth.
"We don't want to bite off more than we can chew. Even though we're an oil company, we've got to have some discipline as we approach this and move forward. So we look at this on a 400-store basis," he said. "We look at the support that goes into that [and] the investment that's required.... It's an incremental journey... Our next horizon is 400 stores. When we get to 400 stores, it'll be a nice problem to have to look and say, 'How do we get to 800 stores? What does that mean? What does that look like?'."
At the same time, Chevron--the sole major oil company that has chosen to maintain a company-operated presence in the retail market with about 400 stores--is looking at how it can maintain and improve its value to its many retailers and marketers, the folks operating the other 8,000 or so stores in Chevron's retail network.
"I remind people we've inherited incredibly strong brands with Chevron and Techron, and our job is to make sure we don't mess that up. And the way you don't mess that up is to build it and grow it," Knuth said. "If we can bring that strong brand with that strong credit-card base...if we can bring that quality brand with quality products, if we can bring reliable supply at competitive prices, and we can bring advertising and promotional [programs] that drive people into those stores, then having us having some company-ops, still being in the direct business, still being in the marketer business, that gives us a diversity in terms of experience that none of the other majors have."
He added, "It also gives us a lot of skin in the game. It's not one of those things where we're just walking away from retail; we're actually fully invested in retail. We want to make sure our marketers and our retailers are successful, and that's why we're still invested in it."
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