Rutter’s Focuses on Food With New Store

The location being built in Leola, Pennsylvania, will have inside seating and a menu featuring Alaskan cod, burgers and corned beef.

December 01, 2015

LEOLA, Penn. – Rutter’s Farm Store has always had an interest in offering fresh food, but its newest location in Leola, Pennsylvania, incorporates a more sophisticated menu, turning the convenience store into a convenience restaurant, Lancaster Online reports. The more than 7,000-square foot store boasts a new kitchen—the R-Kitchen—plus an indoor seating area for 30.

The menu has the usual burgers and pastrami, but also meatballs, corned beef, brisket, crab cakes, shrimp and Alaskan cod. The store exemplifies an industry-wide trend to provide restaurant quality food—and experience—in a convenience store setting. “There is much more of a move afoot to sell restaurant quality food,” said NACS spokesman Jeff Lenard.

Many of the newer or remodeled convenience stores have expanded foodservice and beverage stations to meet the growing demand for fresh, convenient food and drinks. “The convenience store model is going away from the mini mart model—just a small grocery store with smaller aisles and fewer items—to a store that’s based on destinations,” Lenard said.

“We are still a store, a store that serves food like a quick-service restaurant,” added Suzanne Cramer, a Rutter’s spokeswoman.

That distinction means the competition isn’t necessarily other convenience stores—it’s other fast-food restaurants. “Healthy competition is always good. We consider ourselves a leader in whole foodservice,” Cramer said.

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