The company’s initial Marketplace concept opened in February 2016, with the first in the Springfield market arriving the following month, she said. It seems to be a very streamlined process.”Ĭonstruction of the company’s Kum & Go Marketplace stores, which include an open kitchen layout, indoor seating area, complimentary Wi-Fi and charging stations, are incorporated in new store projects, DePhillips said. “They’ve been pretty good to work with overall. “They’re not in a time crunch,” she said. She noted Kum & Go usually submits its permit requests well in advance. While a fast turnaround for securing a permit is two weeks, Davis said the approval process typically averages a couple of months. “We’ve been seeing a big boom in Kum & Go development over the past five years,” she said. “I’ve been very involved with them because I have to review every one of their plans,” Davis said.Īny construction site over an acre is required to receive a city land disturbance permit.ĭavis reviewed four permits from Kum & Go in 2017 and another five of them last year for projects that allowed the company to demolish old stores and build new ones from the ground up. Sarah Davis, stormwater specialist for the city of Springfield, is rather familiar with Kum & Go’s construction projects. Five of those are in the Springfield market. The Springfield area being surrounded by several major routes, such as Highway 60, Highway 65 and Interstate 44, also was attractive.“It fit nicely in with the other markets we have in the Midwest,” DePhillips added.Ĭompanywide, Kum & Go is building 18 stores this year. In 2018, Kum & Go ranked 192nd on Forbes magazine’s list of America’s largest private companies, with $2.4 billion in annual sales.Īs Kum & Go is based in the Midwest – tallying over 430 stores in 11 states – DePhillips said demographics and population growth influences where the company establishes its footprint. “It was a market we saw a lot of potential in.” “We had the opportunity for both companies,” she said of Git-N-Go and Cody’s. That 2009 acquisition was a chance for the company to build out its brand, as DePhillips said a lot of the Cody stores were older assets and targets for renovations or teardowns for new construction. Five years later, Kum & Go purchased 37 area stores from Springfield-based Cody’s Convenience Stores. Kum & Go first arrived in the Springfield market in 2004 via a $9 million acquisition of all but four of Tulsa, Oklahoma-based Git-N-Go stores in bankruptcy court. “We’re still working to fill the 2020 pipeline, so there could be additional ones we’ll be adding,” DePhillips said. Two more stores are on tap next year, she added. Eighteen new stores have been built during the past seven years, with four more currently under construction this year, DePhillips said. That’s 11 percent of its total store count and just one behind the 47 operating in its hometown market of West Des Moines. The company has bolstered its market presence in the area to 46 stores, including the towns of Ozark, Republic and Clever.
With dozens of area stores added to Kum & Go’s portfolio via acquisitions, company officials say the appeal of the Springfield market is a strong employee base and several major routes to draw vehicles needing to fuel up.
“We’re nearing a completion of that plan.”įrom 2012 through next year, the company will have invested about $140 million in the Springfield metropolitan statistical area for construction projects, DePhillips said. “We’ve spent a lot of time rebuilding the market,” said Niki DePhillips, senior vice president of store development at Kum & Go. First entering the Springfield market 15 years ago, West Des Moines, Iowa-based Kum & Go LC’s local construction activity is hard to miss these days.īeginning in 2012, the convenience store chain started building new stores – in some cases, tearing down stores to construct new ones in their place.
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