ORLANDO, Fla. -- Wawa Inc. announced the grand opening Thursday of its 18th store in the greater Orlando market, marking its 27th store to open in Florida.
To highlight the event, the grand opening will be themed pink in honor Wawa's Gold sponsorship of the Susan G. Komen Central Florida Race for the Cure, happening Oct. 6 at the Bright House Networks Stadium at the University of Central Florida. During the Susan G. Komen Central Florida Race for the Cure event, Wawa will provide all food and beverage for the Survivor's In the Pink tent, a place to honor Survivors, and it will celebrate their passion and fight.
Wawa Chefs will be on hand to make fresh, frozen strawberry smoothies, and they will also serve fruits, muffins and other breakfast items to the Survivors and their families.
During the grand opening event, local officials, local heroes and community members will participate in a ribbon-cutting ceremony, and customers will sample Wawa products and witness a charitable hoagie building competition featuring the City of Orlando Police and the City of Orlando Fire Departments, and a breast cancer Survivor's family team, Cure4Sisters. All table cloths and ribbons at the grand opening will be a pink, and the firefighters and police officers participating in the charitable Hoagies For Heroes hoagie building competition will wear pink hats and aprons.
"We are delighted continue to celebrate our expansion throughout the Sunshine State as we celebrate important causes in the community and the men and women who keep us safe every day," said Wawa president and CEO Chris Gheysens. "While we are very proud of our growth in terms of stores and number of new jobs created, we even more proud of the number of causes we have helped and to be a meaningful part of organizations and events like the upcoming Race for the Cure. As we open our new store doors in Orlando, we are more committed than ever to opening our hearts to support causes and organizations that have a positive, meaningful impact on our Florida communities."
Between the Orlando and Tampa Bay markets, Wawa plans to open 25 stores in 2013, 25 stores in 2014 and 25 stores in 2015, and it projects that it will open 100 stores in Florida within the next five years.
The new stores will each employ more than 50 associates, all of which are new positions brought to the area through the development of the stores. Associates in these full and part-time positions will not only receive competitive salaries and health benefits, but will have the opportunity to be enrolled in Wawa's employee stock ownership plan.
Wawa, based in Wawa, Pa., is a chain of more than 600 convenience retail stores (300 offering gasoline) located in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia and Central Florida.
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