Japan-Style 7-Elevens Are Coming to the United States

If social media has made the world feel smaller by connecting us to users all over the world, it’s also made us well aware of what we’re missing here in the United States — and nothing gives us that FOMO feeling like seeing footage of the fabulous 7-Eleven stores of Japan. 

These Japanese convenience stores (or konbini, as they’re called) boast snacks, beverages, and on-the-go meals that put America’s hot dog rollers to shame: onigiri, fried chicken, sushi, egg sandwiches, fresh cakes and pastries, mochi, and an array of hot bar items, to name a few. With our envy reaching a fever pitch, there’s been a renewed effort to get our 7-Elevens up to par — meaning we might soon get a taste of konbini treats here at home. 

Even if you sip Slurpees on the regular, you might be surprised to learn that 7-Eleven, despite being founded in Texas, is a Japanese-owned company. In the 1970s, 7-Eleven opened its first locations in Japan, where the formula proved to be so successful that the operation utterly eclipsed its United States counterpart. By 2005, Seven-Eleven Japan Co., Ltd., owned by Seven & I Holdings, acquired full ownership of the brand.

Since then, Japan has upped its konbini game ceaselessly. Because it offers satisfying food at affordable prices, it’s part of the culture in ways that our minimarts fail to live up to. Thus, the company is considering lending that secret sauce to 7-Eleven’s US locations. 

In February, Bloomberg reported that Ryuichi Isaka, CEO of Seven & I Holdings, is considering how to grow business in the United States, and one area of focus has been mergers and acquisitions. Indeed, 7-Eleven acquired both Sunoco and Speedway earlier this year, and once more brands are united under the 7-Eleven banner, the company can decide how to revamp its offerings.

“We believe that we need to change our business model from one that relies on gasoline and cigarettes to one in which customers choose us based on our products,” Isaka told Bloomberg. “The key to this change is fresh food.”

Isaka’s company is reportedly building out a supply chain that can deliver fresh food daily to American convenience store locations, as well as seasonal offerings and those that cater to regional tastes (two other areas in which the Japanese stores excel). And Seven & I Holdings isn’t necessarily finished with acquiring other businesses, either. 

“If there’s an opportunity, we’d proactively consider M&A,” Isaka told Bloomberg. 

The Wall Street Journal’s video, “The Economics of 7-Eleven,” helps explain what would be involved in revamping the thousands of locations in the U.S. to look more like the Japanese ones we envy. For one thing, the company aims to make one-third of its sales from food, up from its current level of 24%. It’s also looking at upgrading the 17 nationwide commissary locations that supply food to its many thousands of U.S. outlets. The WSJ video also notes that the commissaries have started working with Warabeya, a supplier to 7-Eleven Japan. 

7-Eleven’s evolution has been in the works for years. In early 2020, the company toyed with offering higher quality chocolate as a bid to lure quality-conscious consumers, and it’s had a line of flavored potato chips for roughly a decade. But the move toward fresh, meal-worthy food comes at a time when electric vehicles stand to put a dent in 7-Eleven’s gasoline sales, and declining rates of smoking put high-margin cigarette sales at risk. Those major sources of revenue have to be made up somewhere, and the company is betting on bites. 

The one trade-off here is that better 7-Elevens might only come as the result of those mergers and acquisitions Isaka mentioned, and that could mean a reduction in the number of different U.S. convenience store chains. These various chains tend to reflect their respective regions, offering the mass-market version of “local character,” whereas in Japan things are much more skewed toward the big three brands: 7-Eleven, Lawson, and FamilyMart. 

It’s hard to imagine road trips where the pit stops are all 7-Elevens, rather than bouncing between Wawas, Buc-ee’s, and Maveriks. But it might be a fair trade if we could bite into onigiri as the Rocky Mountains fly by.