LA CROSSE, Wis. — Kwik Trip Inc. has closed on the purchase of the assets of Stop-N-Go of Madison Inc., which operates 36 Stop-N-Go convenience stores in southern Wisconsin and northern Illinois.
Duane and Olympia Bowman founded Stop-N-Go in 1963 with a focus on operating neighborhood grocery stores. In the 1980s, Stop-N-Go underwent a strategic initiative to transform the portfolio into a c-store chain offering motor fuels, which resulted in the closing and selling of many locations, as well as the construction of many new facilities.
Today, Andrew Bowman, president and fourth generation of family ownership, and Kevin O’Brien, CFO, lead the Madison, Wis.-based chain.
- Kwik Trip is No. 13 on CSP’s 2020 Top 202 ranking of c-store chains by number of retail outlets. Stop-N-Go is No. 177.
La Crosse, Wis.-based Kwik Trip, which owns and operates more than 750 c-stores in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa, plans to continue to operate many of the acquired stores under the existing Stop-N-Go banner. It will remodel and rebrand some of the larger stores as Kwik Trip, or as Kwik Star in Iowa.
“Selling our business was one of the most important decisions I’ve had to make not only for our family, but our co-workers, too,” Bowman said.
“Andrew and his team have built an exceptional brand and highly successful company,” said Vance Saunders, managing director of Matrix Capital Markets Group Inc., which managed the transaction. Spencer Cavalier, co-head of Matrix’s Downstream Energy & Convenience Retail Investment Banking Group; and Martin McElroy, associate, also managed the transaction. Richmond, Va.-based Matrix provided merger and acquisition advisory services to Stop-N-Go, which included valuation advisory, marketing the business through a confidential, structured-sale process and negotiation of the transaction.
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