WASHINGTON – Yesterday’s Washington Post featured an article detailing 7-Eleven’s increasing expansion efforts in the Washington, D.C. metro area — more than a store a month. While the company’s expansion is partly due to the simple fact that more people are living in the DC region, thus opening up more capacity to support additional stores, the other reason for the chain’s success is a credit to the 7-Eleven: “Washingtonians like the food at 7-Eleven … a lot,” writes the publication.

Washington is 7-Eleven’s top market in the country when it comes to hot foods, company officials said recently. Among the top sellers: pizza (both whole and sliced), chicken wings, mini tacos, sandwiches and the chain’s trademarked Big Bite hot dogs. Other grab-and-go foods like bakery items (mostly doughnuts and muffins) along with soft drinks and coffee are also bigger sellers in Washington compared with other urban areas.

Company officials said the hot food sales are an indicator of large number of singles, young people and people who are busy and don’t always have time to cook. The chain has 433 stores open or under construction in the area, including 45 in D.C. proper, and it added 16 in the area last year alone, according to the Washington Post article.

According to the Washington D.C. Economic Partnership, which markets D.C. to retailers, many of the new 7-Eleven stores are in areas where new apartment buildings are going up and thousands of new residents have moved in recent years. “They’re going after a select component of items that people need daily, convenience items. Mostly food,” Henry Fonvielle, president of McLean-based real estate developer the Rappaport Cos., told the Washington Post for the article.

Fonvielle told the publication that while traditional grocery stores are now battling Walmart, Target, CVS and other companies over grocery sales, 7-Eleven has doubled down on prepared foods, particularly in markets like Washington. “There’s a lot more food in each 7-Eleven store,” he said, “and they’re doing a pretty good job with quick service.”