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A convenience store is a small store or shop, generally accessible or local. They are often located alongside busy roads, or at gas/petrol stations. This can take the form of gas stations supplementing their income with retail outlets, or convenience stores adding gas to the list of goods on offer. Railway stations also often have a convenience store.
Convenience store in Tokyo Japan
Goods on offer
Sometimes abbreviated to c-store, various types exist, for example: liquor stores (off-licences – offies), mini-markets (mini-marts) or party stores. Typically junk food (candy, ice-cream, soft drinks), lottery tickets, newspapers and magazines are sold. Unless the outlet is a liquor store, the range of alcohol beverages is likely to be limited (i.e. beer and wine) or non-existent. Varying degrees of food supplies are usually available, from household products, to prepackaged foods like sandwiches and frozen burritos. Motoring items such as motor oil, maps and car kit may be sold. Often toiletries and other hygiene products are stocked, as well as pantyhose and contraception. Some of these stores also sell money orders and wire transfer services.
Some convenience stores have a hot food counter, with chicken pieces, breakfast food and many other items. Often there is an in-store bakery – throughout Europe these now sell fresh French bread (or similar). A process of freezing part-baked bread allows easy shipment (often from France) and baking in-store. A delicatessen counter is also popular, offering custom-made sandwiches and baguettes. Some stores have a self-service microwave oven for heating purchased food.
Convenience stores may be combined with other services, such as a train station ticket counter or a post office counter.
Differences from supermarkets
Size is the main difference, although larger newer convenience stores have quite a broad range of items. Prices in a convenience store are typically higher than at a supermarket, mass merchandise store, or auto supply store (with the exception of the goods such as milk, soda and fuel in which convenience stores traditionally do high volume and sometimes use as loss leaders). In the United States, the stores will sometimes be the only stores and services near an interstate highway exit where drivers can buy any kind of food or drink for miles. Most of the profit margin from these stores comes from beer, liquor, and cigarettes.
Convenience stores in the US
Many of these stores in the United States are owned by ethnic Indians, to the degree that an Indian owner of a convenience store has become a stock (and often, stereotypical) character (see Apu, a character in The Simpsons). In some urban areas, ethnic Koreans are also active in owning convenience stores. At times, there have been ethnic tensions between Korean-American convenience store owners and African American customers. Such convenience stores had been subject to looting and arson during the 1992 Los Angeles riots. Many convenience stores in the inner-cities are often targets of robberies.
The first (US) convenience store was opened in Dallas, Texas in 1927 by the Southland Ice Company, which eventually became 7-Eleven. U.S. convenience stores have since developed a somewhat negative reputation as being the frequent target of criminal armed robbery. The job of convenience store night clerk is generally considered one of the most dangerous occupations in the United States. In some of the more violent cities in the US such as Detroit, it is standard practice for the convenience store clerk to work behind a 2" (5cm) thick Lexan bullet-proof glass window.
In parts of the Midwest, especially Michigan, the term "party store" is used, rather than "convenience store." (Whereas, in other places, "party store" refers to a place where one may purchase party supplies.)
Convenience stores in Taiwan
Boasting 8,058 convenience stores in an area of 35,980 km² and a population of 22.9 million, Taiwan has the Asia Pacific’s and perhaps the world’s highest density of convenience stores per person: one store per 2,800 people or .000357 stores per person (2005 ACNielsen ShopperTrends). With 3680 7-Eleven stores, Taiwan also has the world’s highest density of 7-Elevens per person: one store per 6200 people or .000161 stores per person (International Licensing page of 7-Eleven website). In Taipei, it is not unusual to see two 7-Elevens across the street or several of them within a few hundreds of meters of each other.
Because they are found everywhere, convenience stores in Taiwan provide services on behalf of financial institutions or government agencies such as collection of the city parking fee, utility bills, traffic violation fines, and credit card payments. Eighty percent of urban household shoppers in Taiwan visit a convenience store each week (2005 ACNielsen ShopperTrends). The idea of being able to purchase food items, drink, fast food, magazines, videos, computer games, and so on 24hrs a day and at any corner of a street makes life easier for Taiwan's extremely busy and rushed population.
Similar concepts
Convenience stores are similar but not identical to Australian milk bars. Corner shops in the British Isles, still to be found today, were the pre-cursor to the modern European convenience store (e.g. SPAR) in these countries. In the Canadian province of Quebec, dépanneurs are often family-owned neighbourhood shops that serve similar purposes.
Convenience Stores in Fiction
A Quick Stop convenience store in Leonardo, New Jersey was the primary setting for the movie Clerks. Other films with convenience stores include Michael Winterbottom's Butterfly Kiss (1995) with a powerful performance by Amanda Plummer as a demented killer of convenience store clerks. In George Sluizer's The Vanishing (1988), remade in 1993, a woman is abducted at a roadside convenience store while her husband waits outside in the parking lot.
Apu, a character in The Simpsons, runs a local Kwik-E-Mart. In Dennis Etchison's horror short story, "The Late Shift" (originally in Kirby McCauley's anthology Dark Forces, 1980, and excerpted here), the undead work nights at the Stop 'N Start Market and other convenience stores.
List of convenience stores
- 7-Eleven
- Albert Heijn - Netherlands, under the umbrella of Stationsfoodstore (in addition to normal Albert Heijn supermarkets elsewhere)
- Centra - Ireland
- Deli de Luca - Norway
- Happy Shopper (which is owned by Booker Cash & Carry which, in turn, is part of the Big Food Group plc)
- Londis, Morrisons, Budgens, Co-Op/Alldays - United Kingdom, Ireland
- Pressbyrån - Sweden
- SPAR (EuroSpar, SuperSpar) - Large chain throughout Europe
- Wizzl of Servex - Netherlands, train stations, also selling train tickets (they are typically at small stations which have no separate ticket window or counter)
Lawson Terauchicho 1Chome Shop（Osaka・Moriguchi Japan）
See also
See also
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