Brian Hannasch, CEO of Alimentation Couche-Tard, is pictured at the company’s general meeting in Toronto on Sept. 24, 2014.Hannah Yoon/The Canadian Press
Last month, just shy of the two-year mark in his position as president and chief executive officer of global convenience-store giant Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc., Brian Hannasch put the finishing touches on the company's biggest ever acquisition: the all-cash $3.8-billion (U.S.) deal for Texas-based CST Brands Inc.
The transaction – expected to vault Laval, Que.-based Couche past perennial industry leader 7-Eleven in North America, by store count – is a coup for the Iowa-born Mr. Hannasch, who was handed the task of continuing the relentless growth path laid out by Couche founder and executive chairman Alain Bouchard.
Mr. Bouchard and his three close partners – Richard Fortin, Jacques D'Amours and Réal Plourde – built Couche into a dominant player in the sector over 35 years, breaking into the key U.S. market in 2001 with the takeover of the Midwest's Bigfoot chain. Mr. Hannasch, 49, was then Bigfoot's vice-president of operations and stayed on, rising through the ranks to become vice-president of U.S. operations at Couche and – in 2010 – chief operating officer.
Mr. Hannasch talks about the evolving corporate strategy at Couche in a post-founding-partners context, expansion opportunities, the challenges his company faces and his own CEO learning curve.
What was new for you [as CEO]? You had certain strengths in some areas. What was the hardest learning curve?
What was the hardest? That's an interesting question. Certainly the interaction with the financial community – analysts, things like that – was new. So a learning curve there. And being the torch bearer of the culture. Being more visible, more pro-active with our employees. That wouldn't have been my natural inclination, and so I've really had to adapt to that and it's been a great opportunity.
What do you see as the key challenges for Couche-Tard in the sector over the next – say – five to 10 years?
First and foremost, I think about how do we perpetuate the culture that Alain and his partners created 35 years ago and maintain that as we grow across North America, Central America, South America, Asia and Europe. That's a big challenge internally that we're very focused on. Externally, we certainly are watching closely the evolution of online purchasing, online retail. We're certainly watching the evolution, if not revolution, of alternative fuels around the world. In the end, we sell time to people and we think time will continue to be more and more valuable and give us more and more opportunities to be meaningful with our customers.
You don't find it daunting to be going further and further abroad, with a larger geographic footprint and the sense that maybe you don't have the same control that you once did?
I reached that breaking point quite a while ago. I would say there was a time at which I tried to understand what was happening everywhere in the company, but I snapped a number of years ago. It's about finding people that are smarter than I am, trusting them, and giving them space to do the right thing and just making sure we're aligned on values and culture.
Do you travel as much as Alain did or still does?
More. Absolutely more. Yeah. We've gotten bigger. I spend a significant amount of my time getting out into the businesses and trying to meet people. It's getting harder and harder to touch everywhere, but I'll go kicking and screaming because it's important.
Is it fair to say you're increasingly looking outside North America for expansion? Or does North America still have good growth potential?
Despite having over 6,000 stores in the U.S., it's still a fact that the top 20 chains in the U.S. have less than 20 per cent market share, combined. So we see a lot of runway available for us in the U.S. yet. And then Europe, we've got a great presence in Scandinavia, expanded into Ireland, but there are some great countries we think our model would work very well in. So, within our current geography, we still think there is a lot of runway but I still aspire to have a presence in Asia as well.
The interview has been edited and condensed.