C-Stores Upping the Ante for Food, Beverage and Meal Solutions
Also going up at c-stores: square footage. Placer.ai’s whitepaper points to the success of Buc-ee's and Rutter's, which are larger-format stores that have also become trendy among today’s consumers. (Case in point: a billboard in Michigan advertising a Buc-ee’s store 444 miles away has gotten local buzz in that state.)
“Buc-ee’s had a dwell time of 20 minutes, during the first quarter. If you compare that to the rest of the group, which ranges between 9 and 11 minutes, it tells you it’s a different experience,” Hottovy noted.
Beyond getting people to stay longer, Buc-ee’s also gets consumers in more often. Placer.ai’s research shows that the chain is garnering more weekend visits, with 39.6% of visits taking place on the weekends in the first quarter of this year, compared to a rate of 28.3% for the wider c-store industry.
Rutter’s is also doing well within a larger footprint that offers a broader assortment to consumers. As Placer.ai’s paper pointed out, a Rutter’s location in York, Pa., that recently added a second story and bumped up its offerings of wine and beer experienced a 15.6% lift in visits over the past year.