7-Eleven, the Slurpee and a $47 billion takeover battle
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. At 7-Eleven, it all comes back to the Slurpee. The rainbow-hued blend of high-fructose corn syrup, flavoring and carbonated water—not exactly liquid, not exactly solid—is quintessential convenience-store fare.
Quick, sweet, colorful and cheap, around $1 to $2 each. Slurpees are big business, too. 7-Eleven, home of the Slurpee, sold 153 million of them in 2023—a brain-freezing cornerstone in an $80 billion empire of convenience.
The sheer reach of 7-Eleven’s corporate parent, Tokyo-based Seven & i, spanning 85,000 stores dotted across 19 countries, is rivaled only by the range of goods stocked under its stores’ 24-hour fluorescent lighting. Potato chips. Bleach.
Cigarettes. Sunglasses. Power-steering fluid.
7-Eleven’s drink dispensers and glistening roller-dogs have made it a cultural icon name-checked by Bruce Springsteen and Green Day, lampooned in “The Simpsons" and portrayed in the “Grand Theft Auto" videogame series. In the 2013 movie “Escape from Planet Earth," a Slurpee is given to an alien as a peace offering. Now the chain is the object of a multibillion-dollar bidding war between would-be buyers on two continents.
Quebec-based Alimentation Couche-Tard, which owns the Circle K convenience store chain, has offered $47 billion to buy it. Seven & i rebuffed the Canadian firm’s initial offer, which would have augmented Couche-Tard’s existing stable of chain-store brands and powered international growth. This month, a son of the executive who founded 7-Eleven’s current owner submitted a higher bid, which would keep the brand in Japanese hands and prevent foreigners from meddling with the chain’s beloved rice balls and other local favorites.
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