Convenience Stores

Stores in suburban Phoenix and Dearborn, Mo., celebrated their good fortune Thursday with the promise of bonuses for selling the winning tickets in the record Powerball jackpot. “Suddenly the phone can't stop ringing, people are coming in and it's pretty exciting,” Bob Chebat, the manager of a Four Sons convenience store in suburban Phoenix , said by telephone to the Los Angeles Times. “We've been bombarded by telephone calls.” Chebat said he had no idea who purchased the winning ticket, one of two that get to split the $587.5-million jackpot, a record for the Powerball and the second-largest jackpot in U.S. history.

The day after Dunkin' Donuts sent Angelenos salivating with news of its imminent return to Southern California, rival chain Krispy Kreme Doughnuts Inc. said it's growing as well. Krispy's physical presence “is substantially smaller than that of many other brands in the U.S.,” said Chief Executive James H. Morgan at the ICR XChange Conference in Miami on Thursday. But the 75-year-old Winston-Salem, N.C., business is looking for a growth spurt, he said. With more than 740 stores in 21 countries, Krispy Kreme plans to have 1,300 locations by 2017.

Police were searching Monday for a gunman who held up a convenience store and escaped with an undisclosed amount of cash. Witnesses said that shortly after 9 p.m. Sunday, a man walked into Surfside Mini Mart in the 400 block of East Hueneme Road, displayed a black handgun tucked in his waistband and demanded that the clerk empty the cash register, said Sgt. Chris Graham of the Port Hueneme Police Department.

Stores in suburban Phoenix and Dearborn, Mo., celebrated their good fortune Thursday with the promise of bonuses for selling the winning tickets in the record Powerball jackpot. “Suddenly the phone can't stop ringing, people are coming in and it's pretty exciting,” Bob Chebat, the manager of a Four Sons convenience store in suburban Phoenix , said by telephone to the Los Angeles Times. “We've been bombarded by telephone calls.” Chebat said he had no idea who purchased the winning ticket, one of two that get to split the $587.5-million jackpot, a record for the Powerball and the second-largest jackpot in U.S. history.

Faced with a number of requests for licenses to open convenience stores, the City Council has set a study session next week to debate how to regulate such businesses. Some council members have expressed concern that all-night markets could become a magnet for illegal activities such as prostitution and a target for robbers.

Two of Japan's largest convenience store chains--Seven-Eleven and FamilyMart--plan to bring their 24-hour, one-stop shopping to China as early as next year, a newspaper reported Sunday. Seven-Eleven Japan Co., which bought the U.S. 7-Eleven franchise in 1991, plans to open 500 stores in China over the next five years, according to the Japanese business daily Nikkei Shimbun. It will open its first store in Beijing next year.

A statewide coalition of convenience store owners has filed suits against Glendale and six other California cities seeking to overturn ordinances banning the sale of gasoline and alcohol at the same outlet. The Food and Fuel Retailers for Economic Equality, a coalition representing about 3,000 convenience stores in the state, filed suit against Glendale last week in Superior Court in Pasadena.

Flanked by photos of California convenience stores plastered with cigarette advertisements, three House members released a new study Wednesday that suggests that tobacco companies are deliberately targeting point-of-sale promotions at teen-agers.

BP America Inc. said Thursday that it would sell all of its more than 700 company-owned and -operated U.S. convenience stores over the next two years, eliminating nearly 10,000 jobs. The company said most of the sites would be sold to franchise owners, while some would be sold to dealers and large distributors. The sites will continue to sell BP fuels in the eastern U.S. and Arco fuels in the western U.S., with the store brand now to be known as ampm nationwide. About 95% of BP's 13,000 U.S.

Five juveniles suspected of robbing five convenience stores in Orange County within a three-hour period this morning were arrested as they were pulling off their fifth robbery, police said today. The juveniles, all of Anaheim, have been booked on robbery charges and are being held at the Orange County Juvenile Hall.

If you're thinking of going into business for yourself, one option is to buy a franchise in a national or regional chain. Franchises are available for restaurants, hotels, convenience stores, cleaning companies and many other fields. It's not a decision to make lightly. Some things to consider: •Benefits: As a franchisee, the parent company will typically provide you with training, assistance in establishing your business, and help with marketing and advertising. Most franchisers will offer ongoing advice and support.

WASHINGTON - A proposed federal rule that could force convenience stores, pizza joints and supermarkets to post calorie counts on ready-to-eat food items is causing political heartburn on Capitol Hill. As a result, a group of lawmakers, led by Rep. John Carter (R-Texas), have introduced the Common Sense Nutrition Act aimed at limiting the scope of the requirement, largely to restaurants. "The rules the government now seeks to impose on pizza alone would force these guys to wallpaper their stores with calorie information on every possible combination of toppings, while the majority of their customers order delivery over the phone and never come in - and that's crazy," Carter said.

If you're fed up with high gasoline prices, you might want to avoid the roads less traveled. In the remote town of Hana on the Hawaiian island of Maui, you'll find vistas of natural beauty and what may be the nation's most expensive regular-grade gasoline at $6.03 a gallon. You also might skip the scenic drive along Highway 190 in Death Valley, which will lead you to the Furnace Creek Resort, where regular was selling for $5.75 a gallon Tuesday. "It's a resort. They charge what they want," said Raymond, a fellow who declined to give his last name and said he answers the phone at the Furnace Creek Chevron now and then.

Just before opening his convenience store Saturday morning in Albany, N.Y., Steve Gallucci was met at the front door by a reporter with big news: Gallucci's shop had sold the lone winning ticket for the $319 million Mega Millions lottery jackpot, among the largest ever. So like any lotto dreamer, Gallucci checked the two tickets he had bought from his store. Then he double-checked. No luck. "Well, I know for sure now it wasn't me," he said with a chuckle. But Gallucci won't walk away empty-handed.

A fraternity loyalty ritual goes blazingly wrong in the jacked-up indie thriller "Brotherhood. " The film invests a lot of emotional energy in raising moral stakes for the kind of boorish male pranksters it's hard to feel sympathy for when one reads about them in newspaper accounts of fatal hazings and sexual assaults. In first-time feature director Will Canon's all-nighter scenario, co-written with Doug Simon, a frat house's carefully rigged scheme to make a pledge think he's robbing a convenience store leads to bullets flying, a wounded freshman, a kidnapped clerk and circumstances that get progressively worse, complete with the kind of shaky handheld camerawork and endless shouting matches that are the usual indie-movie distress signifiers.

Phoebe Naoum still gets up at 5 a.m., just as she did before her husband's slaying. She still does a few exercises, then walks the dog, which she always did alone anyway because Bassam was off to work by 6. Routine, she tells herself, is glue. It will hold her together for everything the day brings later, when all routine is gone. By 10 a.m. on most days now, she's at Munchies convenience store, walking over the same chipped floor tiles where, several weeks ago, her husband was shot in the back for reasons still unclear.

Orange groves were plentiful, grocery stores distant and home delivery common in the North Hollywood of Pamela Miller's childhood. "The Helms bakery delivered bread, a dairy company delivered milk, and deliverymen brought us seltzer water, meat, fish and vegetables," said Miller, recalling the 1940s and '50s. Once again Miller is picking up the phone to order groceries. For a service charge of $1.

Offering an alternative to the hundreds of liquor stores in South-Central Los Angeles, the Brotherhood Crusade opened a convenience store Wednesday that will stock no drink stronger than alcohol-free sparkling cider. The store opening came as a panel set up by Mayor Tom Bradley after the spring riots submitted a report calling for a moratorium on new liquor stores in South-Central, which has a far greater concentration of the stores than other parts of the county.

BP's businesses include: Gas stations: About 22,400 retail outlets worldwide, including 11,500 in the U.S., under the names BP, Arco, Amoco and Aral (Germany) Convenience stores: About 1,200 AM/PM mini markets, primarily in the western U.S. Motor oil: Castrol Restaurants: About 1,000 Wild Bean cafes, specializing in coffee, baked goods and sandwiches, in Europe, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand Refineries: Sixteen refineries, owned wholly or in part, including one in Carson Alternative energy: Eight wind farms in the U.S., including one at San Gorgonio Pass near Palm Springs

I was warned that meals during my March trip to South Africa would revolve around red meat. But I didn't know it would appear in a shriveled state similar to jerky. Biltong, as it's called — from the Dutch words bil , or buttocks, and tong , or strip — is as ubiquitous in South Africa as men in World Cup jerseys. Gas station convenience stores sell it, of course. But so does the picnic deli at the Spier winery estate in Stellenbosch. There are biltong boutiques in Cape Town's Victoria & Alfred Waterfront mall.