Marilyn Odesser-Torpey

Summer has arrived, and with it fruity and tropical beverage flavors to help customers celebrate the return to life as usual after a year of the COVID-19 pandemic. De Lone Wilson, president of Cubby’s convenience stores with 37 locations in Nebraska, Iowa and South Dakota, knows what varieties of ready-to-drink (RTD) beverages his customers are…

Convenience store customers are more health conscious than ever before, and often look for healthy alternatives when selecting a treat. Dark chocolate is often perceived by customers to be a healthier choice compared to other candy options, but is there any truth to this idea?  A little dark chocolate a day might keep the doctor…

Potato chips are the stars of the salty snack category in convenience stores, accounting for over $1.7 billion in sales, according to a Nielsen research report covering the 52-week period ending Feb. 27, 2021. And that’s during the year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Their variety, versatility and compatibility with a wide range of foods and…

Jerky is salted or spiced lean dried meat that is eaten as a snack or meal replacement. While many tend to think of jerky as beef sticks and strips, it is also available in a wide variety of meats ranging from chicken, turkey and pork to exotic elk and, wild boar and venison. Fish jerky…

Snack cakes are individual-sized cakes and cream- or jelly-filled rolls, cupcakes, coffee cakes, pound cake slices and mini doughnuts that are prepackaged for grab and go. Some are frosted and some are enrobed in chocolate. The cake rolls and cupcakes usually come two or three to a package. Some also come in boxes of multiple…

Tried-and-true c-store foodservice staples like roller grill hot dogs, pizza slices and chicken tenders are an ideal base on which to build an extensive high-quality food offering. Clark’s Pump-N-Shop, which has 68 locations in Kentucky, Ohio, West Virginia and Florida, has long been a foodservice destination with its successful chicken and roller grill programs. As…

A year into the pandemic, consumer cravings for meat snacks have kept the snack category’s sales on an upward trajectory. At the same time, the overall salty snack segment has seen little movement, while sweet snacks have struggled for sales. Meat snack sales increased 12.6% in the 52-week period ending Feb. 27, 2021, according to…

For Americans, anytime is crunch time and salty snacks are the preferred craving crusher whether by the bagful, as an accompaniment to a lunchtime sandwich or by the bowlful while watching the big game on television. To increase sales in this category, convenience stores should position themselves as “salty snack central,” where shoppers can be…

Around this time last year, as the COVID-19 pandemic arrived, c-store retailers found themselves scrambling to implement changes to keep dispensed beverage sales flowing, despite local lockdown orders. Now, many locations are again making adjustments as rules and regulations ease. Pilot Flying J stores temporarily modified their self-serve stations into crew-served ones to satisfy state…

Beef jerky (or ch’arki as it was first called) can trace its history as far back as the 1500s when the Quechua, part of the Incan Empire in South America, began preserving meat by drying it at low temperatures to prevent it from spoiling. Today, Americans still count on dried meat with its portability and…