Fueling Up is a column from C-Store Dive offering a fresh perspective on the top news and trends in the convenience store industry.
Few convenience retailers looked more promising a handful of years ago than Yesway.
By the time the company turned four years old in 2019, it had surpassed 400 c-stores. The bulk of that growth came from Yesway’s $850 million acquisition of Allsup’s, the 300-location chain with stores across New Mexico, Texas and Oklahoma.
The financial growth also was tremendous, as Yesway hit about $1.5 billion in total revenue in 2020 — smashing the $561 million the retailer garnered the year before.
Yesway’s aggressive growth inspired its leaders to take their biggest leap yet. In September 2021, the retailer’s parent company, BW Gas & Convenience, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission to take Yesway public.
The number of shares to be offered and the price range for those shares weren’t established, but the IPO intended to make Yesway the sole managing member of BW while affiliate Brookwood Financial Partners would control all major corporate decisions.
Yesway’s leaders didn’t offer a timeline for the IPO but emphasized in its SEC filing that “we… believe we are well positioned to continue to solidify our market position and grow our store count.”
The retailer also outlined plans at the time to roll out a small-format Allsup’s store model, Allsup’s Express, that would target on-the-go college students seeking quick food options.
But unexpectedly, Yesway axed its IPO plans in late 2022, beginning what I would consider a disappointing few years for the company. Since then, Yesway has barely grown its c-store network, lost some of its top executives to competitors, seemingly scrapped its Allsup’s Express model and revealed forthcoming exits from two of its original markets.
This stunted growth has led to the question that has swirled my brain the past few months: What’s slowing Yesway down?
Unfulfilled growth plans
Brookwood CEO Tom Trkla told C-Store Dive in March 2023 that the IPO was halted because of market volatility. He added that Yesway intended to refile with the SEC later that year.
“We always knew we were going to refile,” Trkla said in that interview. “We’ll refile the S-1 sometimes in the second quarter. We’re working on that right now, updating it.”
But no traction has been made on Yesway’s potential IPO more than two years later. A spokesperson from Yesway did not respond by press time when asked if the company is still considering an IPO at this point.
In that same 2023 interview, Trkla said that he aimed to double Yesway’s store count “in the next four or five years” and was creating the infrastructure to build anywhere from 60 to 80 locations per year.
At that time, Yesway had 430 locations in its network — only 14 less than it had as of late May 2025. A company spokesperson did not respond by press time when asked why Trkla’s large growth plans haven’t materialized.
Not only has Yesway barely grown its c-store count over the past two years, but it’s about to see that number drop with the looming sale of 30 convenience stores across Iowa and Kansas, which C-Store Dive first reported back in February.
Yesway’s spokesperson said in February that these stores didn’t match its overall strategy, but a source close to the situation said that selling these 30 locations — as well as the apparent end to the Allsup’s Express model — are part of an internal retrenchment strategy.
In June, C-Store Dive reported that Omaha, Nebraska-based c-store retailer Mega Saver appears to be looking to buy these 30 sites, signaling that a deal could be approaching.
Yesway’s changing plans this year coincided with longtime Chief Marketing Officer Derek Gaskins and Vice President of Marketing Darrin Samaha leaving for BP and Parker’s Kitchen, respectively, two weeks apart in March. Anyone who’s attended a c-store event in recent years knows Gaskins and Samaha were two of the most familiar faces at Yesway — and losing them was undoubtedly a heavy blow.
Although Yesway isn’t commenting on its challenges, I think it’s clear that there are some financial strains happening behind the scenes. While anything can happen, I doubt an IPO is on the way anytime soon. Whether or not Yesway can rebound from its slow couple years and reach its ambitious store growth goals will be worth monitoring. If it can’t bounce back, we may soon see another mid-size c-store competitor leaving the industry.
