Over a period of just a few months, SQRL Holdings signed a master lease on 210 former Mountain Express gas stations and convenience stores, and then sold its c-store business.
In April, SQRL agreed to sell its c-stores under SQRL Service Stations LLC to Gas Hub Investments LLC, SQRL CFO James Irvine told CSP. He said at the time about 180 SQRL c-stores were open for business.
After the sale closed, though, Gas Hub Investments, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, tried to force SQRL into Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection, claiming that SQRL owes it more than $3 million in unpaid rent, court documents show. Gas Hub said it is seeking to force SQRL into bankruptcy due to “breach of membership unit purchase agreement,” according to court documents filed May 13 in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas.
The money is for unpaid rents that Gas Hub said it did not know about when it purchased SQRL Service Stations LLC, Sidney Scheinberg, an attorney from the law firm Godwin Bowman who represents Gas Hub, told CSP. SQRL had 21 days as of May 13 to respond to its summons for the involuntary bankruptcy case, which was not resolved as of press time. Irvine did not respond to CSP’s request for comment on the bankruptcy case.
The news follows several transitions for the Little Rock, Arkansas-based company. In September 2023, SQRL signed a master lease on 210 former Mountain Express gas stations and c-stores. At the time, SQRL said it expected all the locations to be back up and running within the next three months. Later, the Arkansas Business reported SQRL laid off as many as 400 employees and its founder and CEO Blake Smith stepped away for health reasons and was replaced by Adam Lusthaus.
The Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division confirmed it was investigating a case involving SQRL.
As of press time, it was unclear how many SQRL c-stores were operating, so CSP did not include them in this year’s top 202 count.
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