7-Eleven Stores May Apparently Be Bought Out From a Surprising Canadian Franchise

Normally, I would not publish something like this. It is a feature story on one corporation prospectively buying out and taking over another one. Those are usually the kinds of news stories which, admittedly, interest me not at all.

Hell, when I was searching for the label which this story should be placed under, I was not sure that there even was a "business" section (there's not). And it hardly felt like what I normally would post under "News Op/Ed," although that felt like a reasonably close fit (hence, which it was placed under that, and "General," as well. Still, I wanted to go ahead and post a blog entry about this, because it felt like something of unusual interest for me, and presumably other people out there, perhaps.

This one, however, caught my eye for some reason. Perhaps it is because I do go to 7-11 on a fairly regular basis (probably once to twice a week or so).

But what caught my eye more than that, however, was the company that is apparently set to take 7-11 over.  You see, I know Alimentation Couche-Tard (ACT), mostly for te convenience stores Couche-Tard which are pretty widespread throughout the province of Québec, Canada. They are similar enough to 7-11, and in fact, serve the same purpose, for the most part. In fact, the name of the store franchise, Couche-Tard, implies going to bed late, or that they are up very late. Clearly suggesting that the store is open well beyond most other retail stores.

That is not what is surprising, however. 

You see, when I glanced at the headline, the assumption (clearly mistaken) from my end was that it was probably a major Canadian corporation that everyone has heard of, like Tim Horton's, or something like that.

Couche-Tard?

It feels like one of those places which almost no one outside of the immediate areas where you can find those stores - again, inside and perhaps just outside of  the province of Québec, Canada, with perhaps a few of those stores in French-speaking parts of New Brunswick and perhaps Ontario also having a few - would even have heard of it. After all, a place with a name like Couche-Tard likely would not work in English-speaking provinces, let alone American states.

Not that they will replace the iconic name of 7-11, surely. It just felt to me, at first glance, that if one of those corporations would buy out the other, it likely would have been 7-11 taking over Couche-Tard, and not the other way around.

Guess that was another mistaken assumption on my part.

Owner of 7-Eleven stores receives buyout offer from Canadian rival by Jack Simpson Mon 19 Aug 2024 07.27 EDT

Proposal to Tokyo-based Seven & i by ACT could become biggest foreign takeover of a Japanese firm

https://www.theguardian.com/business/article/2024/aug/19/owner-of-7-eleven-stores-receives-buyout-offer-from-canadian-rival?utm_term=Autofeed&CMP=fb_us&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwY2xjawExCV9leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHQb-ohJrMyvb-AyhONHvDBWgbEyIBCKAgAhoqmhyQ_VY0IMweT6PAo4m3Q_aem_xmhjvI3WRolg_r_GMUL-_A#Echobox=1724067599