There are some big-name competitors in the rural Missouri markets where MFA Oil Co.’s Break Time convenience stores operate. But Jennifer Bach, vice president of operations at MFA Oil Co., said there are a few things that set them apart.
Break Time takes pride in its high-quality fuel and its involvement in the communities in which it operates, Bach said Thursday at CSP’s and Informa Connect’s Outlook Leadership event, held in Rancho Palos Verdes, California.
“We also have a great loyalty program that brings people in every day, and the way it’s structured, it works to get visits into the store,” Bach said.
Members of MyTime Rewards earn 20 points for every dollar spent and 10 points for every gallon of fuel purchased. Customers can redeem points for rewards like food and drinks, or fuel discounts.
They can also earn rewards for visit frequency, according to Break Time’s website. So, for example, one visit a month will get a rewards member a king-size candy bar on their birthday or a free fountain or coffee per month. Twenty visits a month earns the rewards member “big time” status—which allows them to redeem rewards including a 5-cent fuel discount, bonus points on their birthday or two free fountain or coffee drinks per week, along with points earning at a 1.5 rate.
Members must recertify their tier every single month, Bach said.
“So once you hit the high tier, if you can't maintain those numbers of visits the next month, you don't get those rewards,” she said.
- MFA Oil Co./Break Time is No. 98 on CSP’s 2026 Top 202 ranking of convenience-store chains by U.S. store count.
The program keeps customers engaged—customers are very in-tune with the number of visits they’ve accrued, Bach said.
One thing she’d like to work on in the future is better understanding the value of each person in the program and working on better personalization.
“We kind of bucket people and put them in different groups and then send them offers based on their purchasing habits, but we'd like to get more into the personalization,” she said, like determining, if someone is a Red Bull purchaser, then how can they give them different offers than someone who buys a fountain drink.
Backbar reset
Bach also shared how Break Time’s tobacco sales may look different than in other states. They haven’t seen the same decline in cigarettes as the rest of the country, she said.
That’s because their 70-plus stores are predominantly in rural Missouri, a state with the lowest cigarette excise tax in the country. In Missouri, tax is 17 cents per pack of 20 cigarettes, according to an Aug. 3 post from the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit Tax Foundation.
Despite this, modern oral nicotine is still increasing, Bach said.
Last month, the chain completed a backbar rest.
“Over the last five years, we've continually cut that cigarette space back, but now we're probably down about 50% from where we were maybe five years ago,” she said, adding a lot of that space went to modern oral.
Columbia, Missouri-based MFA Oil Co. is a farmer-owned cooperative that offers premium fuels, such as diesel and gasoline, as well as oils, lubricants and propane. It also operates 70-plus Break Time convenience stores in Missouri, which is what Bach oversees.
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