INDIANAPOLIS – More gasoline stations are rebranding and restocking to attract customers with coffee and other merchandise by snapping up independent stations and small gasoline chains, the Indianapolis Star reports.

Many oil companies are selling service stations to focus on oil production, allowing established retailers to acquire more convenience store locations. In Indiana, Circle K has purchased dozens of gasoline stations in the last five years, the newspaper reports.

While drivers may regard Indiana's 2,400 gasoline station-convenience store combos as mere pit stops, many of the stores are accomplished at quick retail service, ringing up total sales of more than $4 million a year per store on average, according to NACS.

In Indianapolis, Circle K has plans to enlarge the former Shell stations to 3,200 to 3,600 square feet to provide easy access to the coffee bar, soft drinks, sandwiches, snacks and merchandise aisles.

Store owners hire people like marketer John Schaninger of Quick Chek in New Jersey to give presentations on the profitability of coffee; Schaninger calls coffee the "new black gold." Urging store operators to select a top coffee roaster, Schaninger notes 10 new coffee customers can produce annual revenue of $40,000 when including all the other items they may purchase in a year.

Throughout the United States, a typical convenience store sells $3 million in fuel and an estimated $1.25 million in merchandise each year, with the merchandise contributing the most profit, reports NACS. Coffee alone represents almost 8 percent of pretax profits.