Judge Catherine Carruthers is scheduled to make her ruling Jan. 7. Swifty Serve's October Chapter 11 petition listed assets of about $75 million and liabilities of $125 million. The chain's stores have been closed for the past three months. The company operated 100 stores in Georgia totaling about 1.2 million sf.

Court records show the chain has received firm offers aggregately valued at about $152 million or $355,972 per store on 427 locations. Swifty Serve co-founders Clay Hamner and Wayne Rogers have tried, unsuccessfully, to buy back 200 stores for about $90 million or $450,000 per location.

Swifty Serve's rise in the convenience store industry began with the purchase of the 62-store Swannee Swifty chain for $5 million or about $80,645 per store, according to a published report. In 1998, Swifty Serve acquired the 488-store E-Z Serve group in Houston for $54 million or about $110,655 per store.