Kerbside convenience: our moves to reimagine retail
Our convenience business provides customers on the move with quality food and beverage-led offers in convenient roadside locations. As customer needs evolve and change, so do we. Here’s a regular update of what’s happening in this fast-moving sector
Latest news in redefining convenience
Luxembourg gets first wildbean cafe
Aral, bp’s retail brand in Luxembourg, opened its first wildbean cafe near the border with Belgium. It’s one of the largest wildbean cafes in the world, featuring a 20-metre (66-foot) counter and selling more than 160 products.
More than 10 million customers per year visit the site, which also has a MyAuchan shop. Customers can try products, including homemade burgers and pizzas made from fresh, locally sourced ingredients, all with the recently awarded ‘Made in Luxembourg’ label.
This opening is part of bp’s wider aim to expand our strategic convenience sites worldwide to around 3,500 by 2030. Aral is the largest provider on the Luxembourg forecourt market with 57 sites.
“We want to be the first choice for customers on the roadside and that means providing fresh, quality food and drink alongside the energy offer we are known for.”
David Phillpot, bp vice president of convenience, Europe
New app for our US brands
bp America has launched the new earnify™ shopping and rewards app, which can be used for savings on fuel and convenience store purchases, as well as to earn points towards future purchases.
bp has more than 8,000 retail locations in the US spread across numerous brands – Amoco, ampm, Thorntons and TravelCenters of America.
The app will replace the current BPme Rewards programme and users can earn points on every dollar spent at most bp and Amoco locations, both on fuel and in-store items. There are plans for it to be rolled out further to select ampm sites and Thorntons in 2025.
bp is working to add new features to the app, including a digital wallet for paying, the ability to order ahead and targeted adverts.
“We’re making it less about the four walls of convenience and more about the entire customer experience.”
Greg Franks, SVP mobility & convenience, Americas
India’s fastest-growing coffee chain
The 100th wildbean cafe in India has opened its doors as part of bp’s effort to open 300 wildbean cafes in the country by 2025.
Wildbean cafe is the fastest-growing coffee chain in India, with around one opening a week since November 2022. The 100th wildbean cafe is at the Jio-bp head office in Mumbai, home to 2,000 Jio-bp and Reliance employees.
It comes as wildbean cafe launched its first branded products across our 100 sites. These include ready-to-drink cold coffees, Makhana (a popped lotus seed), and lentil-based Popped Chips, with more new products being added over the next few months.
India’s wildbean cafes can be found at key metro stations, office campuses, as well as in shopping malls. These are in addition to our Jio-bp retail sites, alongside our fuel and convenience offers.
TravelCenters of America celebrates 300th travel centre milestone
TravelCenters of America Inc. (TA), a bp brand, celebrated the opening of its 300th travel centre in Walton, Kentucky. The opening is a milestone in TA’s plan for growth, complementing bp’s existing convenience and mobility business.
TA is on track to open 20 new locations this year and also has plans to potentially:
- Add 1,600 new truck parking spaces.
- Install biodiesel blending infrastructure and bp pulse EV charging stations at select sites throughout the country.
With a nationwide network of now more than 300 sites across 44 states, safety remains a priority for TA.A new safety campaign driven by TA CEO Debbi Boffa included a recurring panel focusing on how to make TA’s sites safer.
The panel found that lot layout is key to avoid safety problems, from fender benders to security events. By the end of 2024, TA aims to have re-engineered all of its lots based on a safety traffic management plan.
Other initiatives include measures to increase the roadside safety of the thousands of TA technicians who go out on hundreds of calls a day to assist drivers, trucks and trailers that have broken down on the highway.
bp is investing in the future of mobility
In recent years, bp has made significant investments in the future of mobility in the US, starting by introducing its bp pulse electric vehicle charging business to the US in 2021, and acquiring TravelCenters of America for $1.3 billion in 2023.
The investments are a massive expansion of bp’s convenience & mobility business, and, over time, will be part of the company’s transition into an integrated energy company that delivers long-term value for shareholders – and everyday people.
Take a look at four reasons why here.
Stapylton travel centre upgrade
bp in Australia is on a mission to transform our larger travel centre sites this year and through 2025. Stapylton, in Queensland – one of the first sites to receive a major retail upgrade – has just reopened.
The site is conveniently located just off the Pacific Highway between Brisbane and the Gold Coast and now has a refreshed wildbean cafe – including new, made-to-order food options – new store layouts and a complete new fuel system that will allow more product availability for customers.
Other new facilities include a truckers’ lounge with showers, washing machines and toilets.
“After months of work to upgrade our site at bp Stapylton, we’re re-opening with an offer that will provide our customers with a more convenient place to re-fuel, pick up snacks and grab a barista-made coffee on their journeys.”
Paul Auge, vice president of mobility and convenience at bp Australia and New Zealand
New stores in Australia and New Zealand
Wildbean cafe is ‘driving people cravey’ across Australia and New Zealand.
With an average of one million customer touchpoints at Aussie and Kiwi retail sites every day, we’re committed to providing customers with end-to-end mobility needs.
Whether it’s refuelling, charging up, grabbing a barista-made coffee or the variety of fresh food options, our customers can conveniently stop in or grab something on the go.
Our refreshed wildbean cafes are rolling out across Australia and New Zealand, with optimized store layouts to help customers find what they’re looking for.
At select sites, we’re trialling an extended food menu, where customers can opt for made-to-order food such as toasties and loaded fries.
Expanding partnership with Auchan in Poland
bp has signed a deal with Auchan, a leading retailer in Poland, to add 120 Easy Auchan stores to our retail sites in the country.
It follows a successful pilot scheme at nine sites, during which customers were able to try out popular new food choices, including fresh-baked bread, organic products, a wide range of fresh products, and a lot of products labelled with the Auchan brand.
Expected to be complete by the end of 2025, the expansion builds on bp’s existing convenience partnership with Auchan in Luxembourg. The deal also complements our ‘food for now’ offers in Poland under the wildbean cafe brand.
“The partnership with EasyAuchan enables us to access great-value products under a brand that is known and recognized, and bring that to the customer in a way that is easier than if we were to do it on our own.”
Jo Hayward, VP for convenience, Europe
Flagship Jio-bp mobility station
Chai was on the menu when we opened our first Jio-bp mobility station in Mumbai in November 2023.
Part of our joint venture with Reliance Industries, the Jio-bp network offers customers a wealth of products and services, including additivized fuels, Castrol Express oil changes, EV charging and, of course, wildbean cafe.
The wildbean cafe at the Mumbai mobility station offers a range of tasty snacks and beverages tailored with a distinct local flavour, including the brand’s signature coffee, masala chai, samosas and paneer tikka rolls.
Find out more about what’s on offer at the mobility station.
Watch this short film
Big deal for convenience partnership in Germany
Customers in Germany have loved stocking up on food for now and later at REWE To Go stores on our Aral forecourts. That’s set to continue thanks to a five-year extension to our partnership with one of the leading convenience specialists in the country.
The agreement with Lekkerland, REWE’s convenience specialist subsidiary, covers the supply of all Aral’s stores on company-owned retail sites. There are around 1,200 of these sites, of which 850 currently have REWE To Go stores.
This is bp’s largest European convenience supply agreement. Convenience, one of our five transition growth engines, is a key part of our strategy for growth as we transform to an integrated energy company.
“As the energy transition progresses, customers will spend more time at our sites charging their EVs. We will keep evolving our offers to meet their needs, transforming forecourt convenience with new product ranges, store layouts and digital solutions to give our customers what they want, where they want it.”
Jo Hayward, bp vice president, convenience Europe
Find out more in the press release.
Coast-to-coast convenience and mobility
In May 2023, bp completed the $1.3 billion acquisition of TravelCenters of America (TA) – a coast-to-coast network of large-scale mobility and convenience sites serving US highways.
The TA travel centres average 25 acres per site (an American football field is about an acre!) and offer drivers a huge range of amenities when they need a break on the road – from coffee to dining, stores to truck maintenance and repairs.
The acquisition added around 280 sites across 44 states to our retail network – almost doubling bp’s worldwide convenience gross margin overnight.
It complements our existing network stateside, as our bp, ampm or Thorntons LLC sites are mainly found at off-highway locations.
Find out more in the press release.
Watch this film
ampm hits the Big Apple
Our US convenience brand, ampm, is branching out from its West Coast roots with the opening of its first store in New York City.
Located in the Bronx, the new bp-owned and operated store is part of a pilot project to open four ampm sites in the New York market. It features bp branding on the forecourt for fuel and ampm’s food menu, including a hot deli and grocery.
The entire customer-centric experience is run using the operating processes of Thorntons, the renowned Kentucky-based fuel and convenience retailer that bp took full ownership of in 2021.
The new site joins the more than 1,000 stores in the chain located from southern California up to Washington state, that serve upwards of 3,500 different products.
Find out more in the press release.
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