BY Tom Ryan

For convenience stores, the rollout of electric vehicle (EV) charging stations promises to more than offset the loss of foot traffic from declining gas and tobacco sales and further accelerate recent success with grab-and-go food offerings. However, quick-service restaurants and big box stores are also looking to capitalize on EV traffic.

Subway, Taco Bell, and Starbucks are among QSRs that have recently started launching EV-charging projects.

In April, Walmart announced plans to build EV charging stations at thousands of Walmart and Sam’s Club locations across the country by 2030. “With a store or club located within 10 miles of approximately 90% of Americans, we are uniquely positioned to deliver a convenient charging option that will help make EV ownership possible whether people live in rural, suburban or urban areas,” said Walmart’s SVP of Energy Transformation Vishal Kapadia in a press release.

S&P Global Mobility projects that EVs could make up 40% of the U.S.’s new vehicles by 2030, supported by a major push from the Biden administration. S&P further predicted that even though many vehicles can be charged in home garages, the total number of EV chargers available to motorists needs to grow more than eight-fold by 2030 to match forecasted sales demand.

For C-stores and other retailers, the opportunity is capitalizing on the significantly increased dwell time while charging versus getting gas. Peter Rasmussen, CEO of Convenience and Energy Advisors, told Convenience Store News, “Nobody is getting rich selling EV [charging], but the average dwell time is 23 minutes compared to five for gasoline, so you want to have good-quality public restrooms, packaged goods, an experience like a café or quality foodservice to entice them in the store.”

The 2023 Convenience Store News Realities of the Aisle Study, which surveyed 1,500 consumers who shop at a C-store at least once a month, found that 68% of current electric vehicle owners believe it’s “extremely/very important” that a convenience store has an EV charging station.

Incisiv’s 2023 State of the Industry “Future of Convenience Stores” report based on interviews with 125 C-store executives found a whopping 71% highlighting the significance of offerings like EV charging as a differentiator. Of the respondents, 39% intend to expand space for EV charging infrastructure over the next year.

The study also found many C-stores planning upgrades to better compete with investments by grocers and QSRs in to-go food offerings:

• 31% currently see their food offerings as only “satisfactory” with plans for improvement.
• 92% value a unified experience across channels, but 73% face challenges integrating store experiences with digital.
• 61% feel it’s important for C-stores to increase their market share on third-party platforms such as Uber Eats and DoorDash, with 53% planning to prioritize expanding their space for rapid online fulfillment in the next 12 months.
• At the store level, 52% emphasized the need for a transformed in-store look and feel, 43% were either piloting scan-and-go technology or had it on their roadmap, and 24% plan to increase space allocated for in-store dining.