We’ve all watched, from the sidelines, as 7-Eleven stores have steadily increased their food offerings over the past few years. The chain’s new CEO says it’s time for a major breakout. He wants to make US 7-Eleven stores more like their Japanese counterparts…
A typical Konbini: More like a mini-supermarket than a North American convenience store…
The parent company of 7-Eleven stores, headquartered in Japan, has been considering new paths to the future for its flagship chain. If you thought there were plenty of 7-Elevens in the US and Canada already, you might be right. But CEO Ryuichi Asaka wants to increase business further. And he’s come up with a master plan to carve out a bigger share of the North American convenience store market.
“We believe that we need to change our business model from one that relies on gasoline and ci-garettes to one in which customers choose us based on our products,” Isaka told Bloomberg. “The key to this change is fresh food.”
Rise of the ‘konbini’
That’s what they call convenience stores in Japan. But they’re more than what we call a convenience store. Much more. And that’s what Asaka wants his North American 7-Eleven, Sunoco and Speedway stores to become.
Development costs and time involved will be next to zero. Japanese 7-Elevens are already there – a blueprint for the next generation of convenience stores here.
What to expect
According to a Food & Wine story, Japanese konbini-style stores offer, “snacks, beverages, and on-the-go meals that put America’s hot dog rollers to shame: onigiri, fried chicken, sushi, egg sand-wiches, fresh cakes and pastries, mochi, and an array of hot-bar items, to name a few.”
This ‘food-forward’ approach marks a major shift in the traditional convenience store business mo-del. It actually positions convenience stores closer to Fast Food joints than conventional to grab-and-goes, which are often tacked onto ‘parent’ businesses such as service stations. The lotto tickets, ci-garettes, packaged foods and beverages that now headline classic convenience store offerings will take a back seat.
A Wall Street Journal video, The Economics of 7-Eleven, explains, the company wants to generate a full one-third of its sales from food, up from the current 24 percent. The chain is already working with 7-Eleven’s Japanese fresh food supplier, Warabeya, to revamp 17 commissary locations that supply thousands of its U.S. outlets.
My take
This may just be the dawn of a new age in North American convenience store merchandising. I hope so. I long ago dropped convenience stores from my agenda. They just didn’t have anything I needed, anymore. Maybe, after a konbini upgrade, they will, again…
~ Maggie J.