The NACS Executive Committee of the National Association of Convenience Stores has approved a dollar-for-dollar $2.5 million pledge match that will double the ability of the non-profit NACS Foundation to grow its core community impact programs and magnify the work convenience-store leaders and workers do every day to improve the cities and regions where they operate.
The pledge match will also set the foundation on a path toward long-term sustainability and ensure these programs can run long term.
The convenience and fuel retailing industry contributes more than $1 billion a year toward advancing the futures of individuals and families in the communities it serves, NACS said. The NACS Foundation exists to unify and build on those charitable efforts and share its most powerful stories. This pledge-match effort will help the foundation sharpen its strategic focus and drive results.
With the funds raised through this new initiative, the NACS Foundation will:
Expand the efforts to build Neighborhood Nourish, dedicated to addressing food insecurity, hunger relief and food recovery.
Accelerate its Future Fund work, which provides funding support to NACS Executive Education programming, as well as internships and annual scholarships to the employees and family members of NACS retail member companies looking to further their education and ensure top talent stays within the industry.
Continue delivering “impact-driven” programming like 24/7 Day, which every July 24 recognizes the relationship between first responders and the convenience community. Last year, more than 30,000 convenience stores and 80 companies of the NACS community participated in this industry event.
“Convenience stores are often an unsung hero in the community, with many of our members and stores donating millions every day to the causes its customers, employees and partners care about most,” said Kevin O’Connell, executive director of the NACS Foundation. “With this pledge effort, we can not only double that impact, but also grow other programs within our portfolio to make an enormous difference in people’s lives. We’re inviting individual donors and corporate partners to be part of this movement and strengthen the communities we serve for years to come.”
The organization will accept pledges throughout the calendar year to support efforts in 2025. Individual, company and foundation-to-foundation pledges are tax deductible.
Linking Freedom
Through a related initiative, NACS and convenience retail companies Clipper Petroleum, Jet Food Stores, bp and TravelCenters of America came together to raise awareness around human trafficking during a Feb. 1 event in New Orleans, Linking Freedom, led by In Our Backyard (IOB), a national non-profit that is dedicated to the fight against sex and labor trafficking.
Linking Freedom was developed to raise awareness of the problem of human trafficking and to help identify missing children in the area. This was the 16th annual event, which takes place in the host city of the Super Bowl and empowers the community, survivors and local nonprofits in the fight against human trafficking. Every year, missing children and victims of human trafficking are recovered because of this collaborative effort, NACS said.
Clipper Petroleum, Flowery Branch, Georgia, and Jet Food Stores, Sandersville, Georgia, dedicated thousands of dollars through fundraising events, TravelCenters of America provided funding for the development and distribution of community outreach material and bp raised $75,000 and awareness through its Community Pump program.
IOB created and funded the program Convenience Stores Against Trafficking (CSAT) in 2016, starting with one store in Bend, Oregon. Today, 43,300 convenience stores in all 50 states work with CSAT, with 850,000 convenience store staff trained to recognize and safely report the signs of human trafficking. NACS, CSAT and Ready Training Online (RTO) have collaborated on a free online training module, Community Heroes: C-Stores Stop Human Trafficking.
In addition, CSAT provides “Freedom Stickers,” which contain the National Human Trafficking Hotline number, to be posted in restroom stalls—often the only place a victim of human trafficking is alone and safe enough to reach out for help. More than one million Freedom Stickers have been distributed, mostly through convenience stores and even super-sized versions on fuel tankers.
“Roughly half the U.S. population comes to a convenience store every day. Our industry is well equipped to share important messages in stores so that employees and customers can collectively create the equivalent of a neighborhood watch program in their communities. We are proud to work with our members, CSAT and the top leaders in the community to make a difference in people’s lives,” said Jeff Lenard, NACS vice president of media and strategic communications.
Founded in 1961 as the National Association of Convenience Stores, NACS has more than 1,000 retail member companies that cumulatively represent more than 200,000 stores in more than 50 countries, including 90,000 stores in the United States. The U.S. convenience-store industry, with more than 152,000 stores nationwide selling fuel, food and merchandise, conducts 160 million transactions daily and had sales of $860 billion in 2023, according to NACS.
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