In the town of Windsor, Massachusetts, an enclave of 984 people settled in the Berkshires, there is a convenience store called Sangar General Store. Get there early enough and you may snag one of their Indian samosa. The fried savory turnovers are a regional legend. People will travel a considerable way in hopes of getting one. They regularly run out.

Why aren't more convenience stores like this? Some chains are trying. Not Sangar's samosas — you still have to head to Western Massachusetts for that particular treat — but all sorts of foods for various parts of the day that might bring in customers on the promise of an aroma.

As a Placer.ai report from April noted, food has become one way for the big names to draw consumers in. Casey's has grab-and-go breakfast items, including breakfast pizza. Maverik has burritos and items that would seem to go far beyond the first thing you'd have in the morning, such as "made-to-order street tacos and burritos, cookies baked in-house with whole ingredients, loaded nachos, and steaming bowls of chili mac" created by a legit chef, according to Thrillist.

Continue Reading for Free

Register and gain access to:

  • Breaking commercial real estate news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
  • Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
  • Critical coverage of the property casualty insurance and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, PropertyCasualty360 and ThinkAdvisor
NOT FOR REPRINT

© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.