It takes just a handful of statistics from the 2026 NACS State of the Industry (SOI) Summit to tell a significant story about convenience store sales.
It starts with good news: Dollar sales continue to grow. At a record $341 billion, total inside sales grew 1.7% in 2025. The other side of that coin (let’s call it a quarter) is not so shiny: Store traffic is down and inside transactions are hurting—the latter declined 1.7% year over year, according to preliminary NACS SOI data.
The slim difference, the thing that’s keeping the c-store channel in the black, was that quarter—from 2024 to 2025, the average basket size grew 24 cents to reach $7.69.
Add in a full-year inflation rate of 2.7%, and it’s clear the industry has a challenge to overcome. “Convenience revenue is up 0.6%, but inflation is over 2.5%,” said economist Thomas Weinandy of Upside. “Prices are rising faster than consumers can keep up.”
This dilemma has many retailers considering two strategies to keep the ship moving in the right direction: building store traffic and investing in loyalty programs.
‘Beggars Can Be Choosers’
The reason for the decline in store traffic is clear, according to former convenience retailer Chad Lusk, now managing director at management consulting firm Alvarez & Marsal (A&M), New York.
“Consumer sentiment is down. Has been for years. That’s not new,” Lusk said during the summit, citing results from Alvarez & Marsal’s semiannual consumer sentiment survey.
“Consumers are making deliberate and meaningful changes in their behavior in order to be able to survive the economy today,” he said. “Over 60% of consumers told us that they are traveling less in order to complete all of their shopping. That comes in the form of fewer trips and fewer store [visits].”
They’re doing it to save money, according to the survey results, as they consolidate trips to limit fuel use. That’s a double whammy for retailers as consumers cut spending and fill their gas tanks less often.
“In the quest to save money, our financially constrained consumers are changing their-shopping trips and patterns pretty significantly in the form of where they’re shopping and how they’re shopping,” Lusk said.
At the same time, according to Lusk, there’s a counter trend that opens a door of opportunity for retailers. “[While consumers] are making these changes to drive value, they’ve never been more discerning and demanding,” Lusk said. “Beggars actually can be choosers. Who knew?”
This dichotomy—a desire to spend less but purchase higher quality goods—has opened a door to consumer experimentation and put a spotlight on private-label products.
“Brand experimentation is at a peak across categories,” Lusk said. “[It’s] driving trade-up behavior.”
This comes as 68% of consumers say the quality of house brands is as good or better than national brands, according to A&M’s consumer survey. In addition, consumers find private-label brands provide a better variety of unique flavors and meet more dietary or lifestyle needs.
“Product brand loyalty is waning. In other words, consumers are reorienting where brand fits in the hierarchy of their decision-making. It’s falling,” Lusk said. “Consumers care less about the brand on the box or the package as on the attributes that define it, and they’re looking for new ways to find value in what they buy.”
Retailers can take advantage of this shift by investing in private-label products and variety in the form of unique flavors and product attributes, such as high-protein or gluten-free.
“Store-banner brand loyalty is actually greater than product brand loyalty right now,” Lusk said. “In the categories that are of particular importance for this industry—snacks and beverages—in the past six months alone, the percentage of snackers and beverage drinks who have been trying and experimenting with multiple brands is growing.”
Data shows this experimentation is happening across all age demographics but, Lusk said, it over-indexes for younger consumers. “Never have we seen more brand switching or experimenting and less attachment to any single brand than today. It shows the importance of having options and experimentation, and the variety and versatility that consumers are looking for and demanding these days.”
Building Differentiation
Value is the entry point. Loyalty is the reward. Differentiation is the catalyst. That’s the essence of consultant Mike Templeton’s view on loyalty programs.
“We live in a world where people are moving fast, options are everywhere. We’re constantly distracted,” said the partner and vice president at NexChapter. “It’s becoming harder and harder to be differentiated in your market. [You need to] think in new ways about who you are.”
Templeton outlined four trends to differentiation that can be amplified by loyalty programs:
One value system. This is where loyalty and promotions combine, according to Templeton. “Yes, you’ve got a price book, you’ve got a back office, you’ve got a loyalty platform, an app. The customer doesn’t care that those are all separate technologies. You’ve got to think about how to orchestrate all of these things together into one system for the consumer.”
Simplicity wins. Loyalty should be effortless. “There’s a lot of things that have to go into making that possible, but if it’s not easy, they’re not going to buy in.”
The trust contract. You earn relevance in real time from your customers. “Every single moment that passes, you’ve got to make sure that you’re maintaining the trust that they put in you and your brand.”
Go beyond transactions. Give customers new reasons to engage with the retail brand. “It underscores your commitment [to your customers],” Templeton said. “Everything is vying for consumer attention; you must matter more.”
Loyalty as Differentiator
This trending acceptance of store brands and the desire for variety opens a door to building store loyalty, said Marco Valentini, managing director and grocery and food retail lead at A&M.
“Driving loyalty through innovation is very important,” he said. “You can offer unique flavor profiles, unique brands, unique forms [of products]. We see categories that historically have low penetration for private brands now are driving differentiation for [retailers] that are able to deliver them.”
He acknowledged that digital platforms have fast become the primary path to store loyalty today. “Digital loyalty provides an important choice factor,” he said, adding that loyalty program penetration remains low in the c-store channel at less that 30% of retail locations, which is well below other food retail channels, which average above 60%.
“C-stores can unlock stickiness and profitability by scaling core digital capabilities and offerings,” he said.
That’s what Weigel’s is accomplishing with its MyWeigel’s Rewards platform. “Ninety percent of our promotions run through our loyalty platforms,” said Jessica Starnes, director of loyalty for the Powell, Tennessee-based chain of about 80 stores.
That statistic differs dramatically from Kwik Trip’s Kwik Rewards, where about 50% of offers are made through the loyalty platform. “We very much rely on foot traffic and a broad appeal to drive traffic,” said David Jackson, director of marketing at Kwik Trip Inc., a La Crosse, Wisconsin-based retailer with more than 900 stores across the Midwest. “We offer a lot of commodity promotions that help set us apart from other retailers.”
At the smaller Weigel’s, on the other hand, “We have folks who grew up with us,” Starnes said. “That’s an advantage of being a local company. We earn customers’ trust through our reputation.”
MyWeigel’s loyalty members receive points for every purchase they make in a Weigel’s store or on the forecourt. Points add up to free products. Other benefits include “clubs” that award a free gallon of milk or slice of pizza, games to earn rewards and a mobile payment option that saves customers 10 cents per gallon at the fuel pump.
Customers can sign up for the rewards program online, via the MyWeigle’s app or in stores. Maintaining that flexibility has proven important to driver enrollment. After launching the program in 2018, Weigel’s struggled to build membership early on, Starnes said. The solution was to offer loyalty benefits to customers who shared their phone number at checkout, whether they were members or not.
“We were having a problem with registration. We couldn’t reduce the friction of signup,” Starnes said. Now, when a customer shares a phone number, “We immediately send a text link to sign up as soon as they leave the store. We get about 40% conversion from that.”
The results are undeniable: In 2025, MyWeigel’s Rewards supported more than 20 million reward transactions and delivered more than $17 million in savings to its customers. It’s also driving traffic and sales where it matters most. “Our top redemptions are proprietary items and fuel discounts,” Starnes said.
Kwik Trip has also grappled with getting customers to register for its digital loyalty platform. With many stores in small, rural communities, it finds some customers don’t want to share a phone number or don’t have a smart phone.
“The tech itself is a friction point,” Jackson said. The solution was to maintain familiar tools from the predigital era of loyalty. “We still have a paper application for those who need it. We still have a punch card [to earn a free gallon of] milk. So, customers can be loyal to KT without the technology.”
Kwik Rewards awards point on every purchase that can be redeemed for free food and merchandise and discounts at the pump. Members can take advantage of digital reward cards to replace those physical milk cards. Mobile payment is also available, among other attributes.
“The biggest thing for us is making sure it’s working like it’s supposed to [and addressing] store education,” Jackson said. “We want to make sure our associates understand the program so they can explain it well and provide the best possible customer service.”
Both retailers also acknowledged a need to extend the brand beyond the store.
Weigel’s does it through NIL (name, image and likeness) sponsorships with local athletes. Starnes said celebrating a great play by local athletes provides opportunities for news coverage by local media outlets, getting the Weigel’s name in front of consumers in unexpected ways.
Meanwhile, Kwik Trip has built sponsorship relationships with several professional sports teams in their markets, including the Green Bay Packers, Milwaukee Brewers and Minnesota Twins. For customers, the Fan Zone feature of Kwik Rewards can add up to sports merchandise, gift cards, sweepstakes entries and even game tickets.
“This is our way to branch out rewards beyond the box, beyond the store,” Jackson said. “We’re helping our loyal customers get experiences that they otherwise would not achieve.”
Mike Templeton, partner and vice president of technology consulting firm NexChapter, calls it “loyalty in daily life,” moving beyond transactions.
“How do you show up in their daily life?” he asked. “Take your brand beyond the store. ... Emotional and experiential loyalty will reshape brand relationships.”
Whether that’s a formal loyalty offer, unexpected rewards, or creating acceptance of store brands, retailers have a template to differentiate themselves to improve store traffic and basket spend. Remember, 24 cents can make a world of difference.
3 Strategies to Build Store Traffic
Citing the strategies of some of the leading retailers in convenience, consultant Chad Lusk of Alvarez & Marsal recommended the following strategies to build store traffic.
Build a superior shopping experience. This is winning at the basics: speed of service, clean bathrooms, a well-stocked coffee station, fresh food and so on. “Seventy percent of shoppers link cleanliness to their beliefs around the freshness of food,” Lusk said. “Freshness equals quality.”
Win on value and differentiated offer. “We need to provide a really compelling, value-oriented assortment. ... Value does not mean lowest price point. Value exists across all price points in the spectrum.” It can mean better taste and better ingredients, even if it’s at a premium price.
Activate digital and loyalty ecosystems. The functions can improve the elements above by removing friction and driving frequency and engagement. “Consumers demand speed of service, convenience and in-and-out executional abilities. Finding points of friction in the shopping experience and eliminating them is super critical.”
