Sacramento, California, is welcoming its first-ever drive-thru convenience store with the opening of Fire Stop, reported Fox40. The business is open seven days a week and plans to eventually be open 24 hours a day.

Co-owners Sam Perez and Simone Nash decided to open a drive-thru c-store after spending a year living in Ohio, where, the TV station noted, drive-thru convenience stores are common. When moving back to California, they saw a need in the market for a drive-thru store. 

“I went and lived [in Ohio] for a year, and I was so shocked of how easy it is to go to a drive-thru store and get your items without getting out of the car,” Nash told FOX40.com. “When we moved back to Sacramento, our plan needed to be to start a drive-thru store … and it’s surprising that there’s none in this area.” 

“Since then, I’ve been thinking I had to open up a drive-thru convenience store,” Perez said. “They don’t know what they’re missing out on.”

Sacremento’s first drive-thru, Fire Stop, is a drive-thru-only convenience store, as customers are not allowed inside the building. The store has windows on each side of the building where customers drive up, place their orders and receive their items before driving off.

The business sells Hostess products, cookies, crackers, nuts, candy, chips and beverages. Beverage options include soda, energy drinks, coffee, water, Gatorade, tea and juice.

Nash and Perez are in the process of obtaining a license to sell tobacco, beer and wine products.

Drive-thrus at QSRs are more popular than ever. A report from Revenue Management Solutions from September of this year noted that drive-thrus now account for two-thirds of all fast-food purchases.

Check out “The Ins and Outs of Drive-Thru” in the September 2023 issue of NACS Magazine to read how c-stores are competing.