Charles M. Nifong
Thank you, Maura. Maura and I appreciate everyone joining us this morning, and thank you for making the time to be with us today. During today's call, I will go through some of the operating highlights for the second quarter. I will also provide commentary on the market and a few other updates as I typically do on our calls. Maura will then review in more detail our financial results. Before I jump into a detailed review of our operating results, I want to highlight some important strategic actions that we executed during the quarter and then talk about our operating results from a high level. We had a record dollar value of asset sales during the quarter. We realized approximately $64 million in proceeds from asset sales during the quarter that we primarily used to pay down debt. For the most part, we sold sites with continuing fuel supply relationships, so we realized an extremely attractive effective multiple on these divestitures. We also lessened our real estate ownership in markets such as Kansas and Colorado, which are not part of our long-term strategic plans for real estate ownership. So these transactions not only strengthened our financial position today, they also strengthened our operating portfolio today and for the future. On the operations side, our results reflect a continuation of the challenging environment as our results on an EBITDA basis were below the prior year, but significantly better than the first quarter. Fuel market volatility so far this year has been lower, limiting fuel margin opportunities. Consumers, particularly lower income, have been selective in their spending. While our fuel volume and store sales outperformed the industry for the quarter, they were still impacted by these factors, which weighed on our results. With that backdrop, if you turn to Slide 4, I will briefly review in more detail some of our operating results for the quarter. For the second quarter of 2025, our retail segment gross profit decreased 1% to $76.1 million compared to $76.6 million in the second quarter of 2024. The decrease was primarily driven by a decline in motor fuel gross profit. Our retail fuel margin was down slightly for the quarter compared to the prior year. For the quarter, our retail fuel margin on a cents per gallon basis decreased 1% year-over-year as our fuel margin was $0.37 per gallon in the second quarter of 2025 compared to $0.373 per gallon in the second quarter of 2024. In comparison to the prior year, crude oil prices were less volatile during the second quarter of 2025, which resulted in lower market volatility. And as a result, our retail fuel margins were slightly lower year-over-year. For volume on a same-store basis, our overall retail volume declined 2% for the quarter year-over-year. Volume demand started off the quarter soft in April and improved from there, the last weeks of June ending the quarter on a strong note. Based on national demand data available to us, national volume demand was down approximately 4% for the quarter. Compared to the first quarter, where our retail volume was approximately in line with national volume demand. This quarter, we returned to outperforming national volume demand while still achieving solid fuel margin results. In the period since the quarter end, overall retail same-store volume has been down around 1%, while national volume demand has been down approximately 2% to 3%. In the same period, retail fuel margins have been higher than our second quarter fuel margins. For inside sales on a same-site basis, our inside sales were up approximately 2% compared to the prior year for the second quarter. Inside sales, excluding cigarettes, increased 4% year-over-year on a same-store basis for the quarter. Our beverage and food categories were strong performers for us this quarter, with the food results particularly encouraging given our ongoing initiatives in this category. Maura will provide more color on our food initiatives in her remarks. Based on national demand data available to us, national demand for inside store sales for the quarter was approximately flat on an overall sales basis year-over- year. So on a relative basis, our retail segment inside sales outperformed the industry for the quarter. On the store merchandise margin front, our merchandise gross profit increased by 2% to $30.5 million, driven by our increased sales from the higher average store count and an increase in sales in our base business. The store merchandise margin percentage declined slightly for the quarter compared to the prior year. In the period since the quarter end, same-store inside sales have been up approximately 4% compared to the prior year. In our retail segment, if you look at our total number of retail sites, our company-operated site count decreased by 15 sites this quarter relative to the first quarter. The decrease in company-operated sites reflects the asset sales we completed during the quarter. The divested locations were generally lower performing sites in markets that we have decided were no longer strategic for us. Our commission agent site count increased modestly by 2 sites during the quarter relative to the first quarter as we continue to convert sites over to our retail class of trade as opportunities arise. We continue to look for opportunities in our portfolio to increase our retail exposure and our overall strategy with retail has not changed. The divestitures this quarter represent our execution on our continued strategic focus on being in retail in the right markets. Our retail segment outperformed the market during the second quarter in both same-store volume and store sales, although same-store volume was down year-over-year. Our same-store volume and store sale results reflect the challenging dynamics in the marketplace where certain consumer segments continue to feel pressure and have modified their purchasing behavior. Our results on the expense side also reflect some of the same pressure, and Maura will touch on this in more detail in her comments. The retail operating environment improved towards the end of June and July was an overall strong month from a volume, sales and fuel margin perspective for us. Moving on to the Wholesale segment. For the second quarter of 2025, our wholesale segment gross profit declined 12% to $24.9 million compared to $28.1 million in the second quarter of 2024. The decrease was primarily driven by a decline in fuel volume, fuel margin and rental income. The primary factor for the fuel volume and rental income decline by a significant degree was the conversion of certain lessee dealer sites to company-operated and commission agent sites, which are now accounted for in the retail segment. Our wholesale motor fuel gross profit declined 9% to $15.2 million in the second quarter of 2025 from $16.6 million in the second quarter of 2024. Our fuel margin decreased 2% from $0.087 per gallon in the second quarter of 2024 to $0.085 per gallon in the second quarter of 2025. The decline in our wholesale fuel margin per gallon was primarily driven by movements in crude oil prices and lower prompt pay discounts associated with lower gasoline prices, which reflect the lower crude oil prices during the quarter compared to the prior year, partially offset by better sourcing costs. On product sourcing costs, we continue to make meaningful progress on this front and signed new agreements during the quarter that further reduced our product sourcing costs on a material number of gallons. Our wholesale volume was 179.2 million gallons for the second quarter of 2025 compared to 192.1 million gallons in the second quarter of 2024, reflecting a decline of 7%. The decline in volume when compared to the same period in 2024 was primarily due to the conversion of certain lessee dealer sites to our retail class of trade. The gallons from these converted sites are now reflected in our retail segment results. For the quarter, our same-store volume in the wholesale segment was down approximately 2% year-over-year. So the additional approximately 5% drop in volume, the difference between the overall volume decline of 7% and our same-store volume decline of 2% for the segment was largely due to converting sites to the retail segment. As mentioned in my retail segment comments, national demand data available to us indicated national volume demand was down around 4% for the quarter. So our same-store wholesale volume performance for the second quarter outperformed overall national volume demand. In the period since the quarter end, wholesale same-store volume has been down around 2%, so in line to slightly better than national volume demand, which has been down 2% to 3% over the same period. Regarding our wholesale rent, our base rent for the quarter was $9.3 million compared to the prior year of $11.2 million, a decrease due to the conversion of certain lesy dealer sites to company-operated sites as well as due to our real estate rationalization efforts. As you know, the rent dollars for the converted sites while no longer in the form of rent are now effectively in our retail segment results through our fuel and store sales margins at these locations. As I touched on at the start of my comments, we had a record quarter for asset sales in the second quarter, divesting 60 sites for $64 million in proceeds. The impact of these sales is immediately apparent on our balance sheet at quarter end as we reduced debt by over $50 million relative to the first quarter. Operationally, these sites were not strategic and were generally lower-performing locations for us. However, we did retain fuel supply at the majority of the locations. And as a result, these asset sales were done at very attractive and effective multiples. We have a strong pipeline of asset sales for the rest of the year and expect to continue to add meaningfully to the total dollar value of sites divested by the end of the year. Overall, during the second quarter, we made meaningful progress on our strategic goals with our divestitures, which strengthened our balance sheet and further optimize our operating portfolio for the future. Our operational results for the quarter on an EBITDA basis were lower year-over-year as we continue to navigate a challenging demand environment, along with lower volatility in the fuel market. However, fuel volume and store sales demand at our sites was stronger than the overall market, indicating our solid market position and that the portfolio is well positioned for success. With that, I'll turn it over to Maura to further discuss our financial results.