Wawa is opening its first travel center in Hope Mills, North Carolina, in the second quarter of 2025, the company announced on Wednesday, according to the Greater Fayetteville Business Journal.
The travel center will offer expanded restrooms, more parking, parking for RVs and other large vehicles and in-store seating. For the professional driver, the travel center will have high-speed diesel fuel, a Certified Automated Truck (CAT) weigh station, free tractor trailer parking and merchandise, said Ted Lobst, manager of engineering at Wawa.
- Wawa is No. 10 on CSP’s 2024 Top 40 Update to the 2023 Top 202 ranking of U.S. c-store chains by store count. Watch for the full 2024 Top 202 ranking in the June issue of CSP magazine and in CSP Daily News.
Wawa is also planning up to 15 stores in the Fayetteville, North Carolina, area in the next five to eight years.
Development on the first Fayetteville, North Carolina, location at Raeford Road and Roxie Road and the Lumberton location is expected to begin in the next 30 days with a timeline in place to open both locations in early 2025.
To build each store, Wawa will be investing more than $7 million per store and employ, on average, 140 contractors and local partners to help with construction. Once open, each store will employ an average of 35 employees.
Additionally, in 2025, Wawa expects to open up to 11 stores in additional counties including Robeson, Cumberland, Pitt, Onslow, Johnston, Nash, Pender, Brunswick and New Hanover Counties, according to the Greater Fayetteville Business Journal. Over the next eight to 10 years, Wawa plans to open six to eight stores per year reaching a total of 90 stores throughout the state and bringing an estimated 3,000 new long-term jobs as a result of their expansion into North Carolina.
“What we promise to deliver you is fresh food and beverages every time you visit,” said Mary-Rose Hannum, vice president of food and beverages at Wawa. “And we have hundreds if not thousands of choices, based on that customization, so that you can make it the way you want it. You can get your favorite hoagie or your sandwich, whatever it may be, just the way you like it. And then, if you're in a rush on the way home, and you need a pizza, we'll have that for you too. There’s just endless combinations, and we have that because we’re listening to customers and making sure that we have the right products.”
This information was revealed at Wawa’s third stop of its Community Partnership Tour across North Carolina. During the event, held at Segra Stadium in Downtown Fayetteville, Wawa customers were able to get a taste of breakfast and lunch menu items, share stories of their past experiences with the brand and hear from leadership about the company’s plans to come to Fayetteville and beyond.
Also during the event, The Wawa Foundation partnered with the United Service Organizations (USO) of North Carolina’s Fort Liberty chapter. During the event they helped organize volunteers and attendees of the event to assemble more than 200 care packages to be distributed to military members through USO programs serving military bases in the region. They also presented a $5,000 donation to the USO of North Carolina.
Wawa has more than 1,000 stores in Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, Florida and Washington, D.C. The Wawa, Pennsylvania-based company previously announced that it will open 80 c-stores in North Carolina, the first eight in 2024, and up to 20 in Georgia, with the first under construction in late 2023. Wawa also has revealed plans for 160 stores across the Midwest in Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana. And it said it plans to grow its store count in existing markets.
Members help make our journalism possible. Become a CSP member today and unlock exclusive benefits, including unlimited access to all of our content. Sign up here.