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The Yomiuri Shimbun Stephen Hayes Dacus, the incoming president and chief executive officer for Seven & i Holdings Co., right, and Ryuichi Isaka, the current president and CEO, shake hands after a press conference on March 6 in Tokyo.
By Tomohiko Kanai and Tomoko Echizenya / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writers
10:53 JST, March 15, 2025
Stephen Hayes Dacus, the incoming president and chief executive officer of Seven & i Holdings Co., expressed caution about the proposed acquisition by Canadian convenience store giant Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc., in a recent exclusive interview with The Yomiuri Shimbun.
He stressed that he intends to maintain independent management and to reform the convenience store business so that Seven & i can improve its corporate value. “[We will] provide new products, better products, new services, better services, that generate growth,” he said.
Dacus, currently chairman of the company’s board of directors, also served as the chairman of a special committee of outside directors that examined Couche-Tard’s acquisition offer, and he was involved in negotiations with Couche-Tard until the day before it was announced that he would be the next president.
Negotiations were focused on how to handle stores in the United States should the acquisition go through. The U.S. antitrust authority, the Federal Trade Commission, would very likely require the sale of about 2,000 stores located close to each other. Couche-Tard has insisted that any sale or other discussions will take place after a deal has been signed. “They provided no clear solutions. They just kept saying, trust us. We can do this. We’ll work it out.”
According to Dacus, Couche-Tard argued in the negotiations that it had grown through a series of acquisitions and had responded to the FTC’s demands on numerous occasions. However, he pointed out that many of these acquisitions have been small. With Seven & i, the leading convenience store chain in the United States, “The scale is radically different, and therefore the approach to the FTC is likely to be radically different. They [the FTC] are going to be much stricter,” he said.
More talks before deal
There is also strong concern that unprofitable stores in Japan will be closed if Couche-Tard acquires the company. Couche-Tard denies it would take such action, but “closing unprofitable stores is the easiest way to cut costs,” Dacus said, adding that Couche-Tard has closed many of the stores it has acquired in the past. Store closures will have a social impact, he argued, and he wants to “continue the strong relationship we have with our franchisees.”
At the suggestion of Seven & i, the Canadian firm recently agreed to have preliminary talks before an acquisition contract is signed, including on finding buyers for stores. While expressing caution, Dacus also said he did “not foreclose the option of proceeding with Couche-Tard,” and that he is “continuing to engage very constructively with Couche-Tard.”
Seven & i received an acquisition offer from a foreign investor in part because of how its stock price has stagnated. The company announced on March 6 that it would buy back around 2 trillion yen worth of its own shares by fiscal 2030 to strengthen shareholder returns. “I don’t think the company [has] put enough emphasis on its shareholders,” Dacus admitted. “We were slow to embrace the change,” he added, referring to how Japanese companies have become more focused on shareholders’ interests.
Store-made food and home delivery
As for reforms to the convenience store business, Dacus said he will increase sales by leveraging the roughly 22,000 stores in Japan and move fast to understand and satisfy customer needs. The convenience store market in Japan is saturated, and there is stiff competition due to the shrinking population and the rise of small supermarkets in urban areas. Specifically, he explained that the company will aggressively develop a system that combines improvements in store-cooked food with home delivery.
The U.S. business, which had been positioned as a pillar of growth, has been suffering a downturn in performance due to sluggish consumption caused by inflation. Dacus said some stores are outdated and look old, and “we should invest a lot more in terms of the remodeling and the upkeep of the stores,” adding that he will also accelerate investment in improving fresh food products. In addition to working with Japanese food manufacturers to develop products of the same quality as those in Japan, the company will also strengthen delivery services.
