COPENHAGEN—Circle K is the winner of the prestigious 2025 NACS Convenience Retail Technology Award Europe. This recognition highlights Circle K's commitment to leveraging innovative technology and effective practices to recruit, onboard, and engage employees at scale across its European markets. The award was presented this week at the NACS Convenience Summit Europe in Copenhagen.
Circle K operates 5,200 stores across 12 European countries, hiring 8,000 to 10,000 employees in Europe annually. The competitive labor market in recent years made it challenging for the company to attract and retain new employees, leading to varied store performance, nearly 80% turnover, and many new hires leaving within 30 days.
To address these concerns, Circle K focused on streamlining the hiring process by using artificial intelligence for candidate evaluations, which led to a more efficient recruitment system that has processed over 230,000 applicants. Today, this system frees up valuable time for store managers to screen applications, and as the process evolves, predictive analytics will continue to optimize hiring practices and employee selection criteria.
Circle K also developed an immersive digital training program to enhance the onboarding process. This interactive, game-based platform combines digital learning with practical, hands-on experiences, ensuring every new hire gets a strong start.
For continued training, Circle K has invested in the Customer Star Program, a digital solution that empowers employees to create engaging experiences with customers. The platform turns learning into a game, allowing employees to practice their skills in a safe, digital environment.
Overall, these three areas of digital transformation in the recruitment, onboarding and retention process have resulted in a 90% increase in job applications, a 24% improvement in employee readiness, and a 13% reduction in turnover rates.
The 2025 NACS Convenience Summit Europe is taking place May 26-28, in Copenhagen, Denmark. Next year, the event will take place June 2-6 in Warsaw, Poland. See more event information at convenience.org/CSE.