KEENE, N.H. -- With two recent acquisitions in the Northeast under its belt, Global Partners LP is expanding its retail footprint in New Hampshire and Vermont as the company “benefits from economies of scale in the purchase of fuel and convenience-store merchandise,” said Global Partners President and CEO Eric Slifka.
The company said in May that it was acquiring Cheshire Oil Co. LLC’s 10 T-Bird Mini Mart c-stores and gas stations.
The Cheshire portfolio has nine stores in New Hampshire and one in Brattleboro, Vt. All of the locations are branded T-Bird Mini Marts and sell CITGO fuel. Dead River Co., Portland, Maine, acquired Cheshire Oil’s home heating oil, HVAC and burner service and commercial fuels businesses, which operate in southwestern New Hampshire.
A deal for Cheshire Oil to sell its T-Bird locations to Energy North Group, Lawrence, Mass., fell through earlier this year after it failed to close, said a report by Valley News.
Keene, N.H.-based Cheshire Oil is a fourth-generation family business that George Robertson founded in 1921. It operated gas stations in the 1920s and 1930s before expanding into the home heating oil delivery business in the 1940s and 1950s. In the mid-1980s the company created its T-Bird Mini Marts brand, which Robertson's grandson, James Robertson, and great-granddaughter, JoJi Robertson, have grown into a chain of 10 high-volume stores.
The Cheshire deal complemented Global Partners’ acquisition, also announced in May, of 37 gas stations with Jiffy Mart c-stores in Vermont and New Hampshire from Champlain Oil Co. Inc., South Burlington, Vt. It also included 24 owned or leased fuel sites, including lessee dealer and commission-agent locations, and fuel-supply agreements for 70 gas stations in Vermont and New Hampshire.
Richmond, Va.-based Matrix Capital Markets Group Inc. provided merger and acquisition advisory services to Cheshire Oil.
Global Partners said it expects the purchase to close in the third quarter of 2018, subject to customary closing conditions.
Waltham, Mass.-based Global Partners is a midstream logistics and marketing master limited partnership (MLP) with one of the largest terminal networks in the Northeast. With about 1,500 locations, primarily in the Northeast, Global is one of the largest regional independent owners, suppliers and operators of gas stations and c-stores. It operates c-stores under the Alltown Market, Alliance and Xtra Mart names.
- Global Partners is No. 29 on CSP’s 2018 Top 202 ranking of c-store chains by number of company-operated retail outlets.
The company is also one of the largest distributors of gasoline, distillates, residual oil and renewable fuels to wholesalers, retailers and commercial customers in New England and New York. It is also engaged in the transportation of petroleum products and renewable fuels by rail from the mid-continental United States and Canada.
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