Road Ranger is a

Schaumburg, Illinois Schaumburg ( ) is a village mostly in Cook County and partly in DuPage County in northeastern Illinois, United States. Per the 2020 Census, the population was 78,723. Schaumburg is around northwest of the Chicago Loop and northwest of O'Har ...

-based chain of travel centers,

truck stop A truck stop, known as a service station in the United Kingdom, and a travel center by major chains in the United States, is a commercial facility which provides refueling, rest (parking), and often ready-made food and other services to moto ...

s and convenience stores primarily found in the mid-western United States.

History

The first Road Ranger was opened in 1984 in Rockford, Illinois, by

Northern Illinois University Northern Illinois University (NIU) is a public research university in DeKalb, Illinois. It was founded as Northern Illinois State Normal School on May 22, 1895, by Illinois Governor John P. Altgeld as part of an expansion of the state's system ...

business graduate Daniel "Dan" Arnold. The first location was purchased with $5,000 of Arnold's savings and a loan taken out by him and his wife. Arnold sold the company to

Phillips Petroleum Phillips Petroleum Company was an American oil company incorporated in 1917 that expanded into petroleum refining, marketing and transportation, natural gas gathering and the chemicals sectors. It was Phillips Petroleum that first found oil in th ...

in 1990 to pursue other interests in real estate and banking, but eventually restarted the company in 1994.Road Ranger and Kiswaukee College
/ref> In 2008

Pilot Flying J Pilot Travel Centers LLC, doing business as Pilot Flying J, is a North American chain of truck stops in the United States and Canada. The company is based in Knoxville, Tennessee, where Pilot Corporation, the majority owner, is based. The compa ...

announced it was partnering with Road Ranger and would market the diesel fuel at Road Ranger truck stop locations. Road Ranger was owned by Daniel Arnold and co-owner Sunil Puri, founder of First Midwest Group. Arnold died on November 17, 2015. On March 19, 2015, Road Ranger completed the sale of 42 convenience store locations in Iowa, Illinois and Kentucky to GPM Investments,List of locations sold to GPM Investments
/ref> leaving its focus on travel centers, usually in partnership with Pilot at that time. On August 27, 2018, Santiago Chile based Enex (Empresa Nacional de Energía Enex S.A.), a subsidiary of

Quiñenco Quiñenco S.A is a Chile-based company engaged in the investment in companies active in the industrial and financial sectors. It is one of Chile’s largest business conglomerates, with US$71 billion in assets under management. Founded in 1957 by ...

announced its intention
to acquire Road Ranger for US$289 million, in what is believed to be th

in Rockford, Illinois history. On November 30, 2018 Ene
announced
it had completed the Road Ranger acquisition and announced its plans to grow Road Ranger in the US by three to four locations per year. In early 2019 Road Ranger ended its relationship across the United States with Pilot Flying J. As of February 1, 2019, Road Ranger marketed diesel fuel to trucking companies and transportation providers across the United States under the Road Ranger trade name, unaffiliated with any other company or name.

Top Tier Gasoline

Road Ranger distributes Top Tier Detergent Gasoline in its own branded Ranger Fuels offering, although in 2010 this was not available at all locations.Top Tier Retailers
/ref>

Locations

Road Ranger operates 45 unaffiliated travel center and convenience store locations in the states of

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rock ...

Iowa Iowa () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States, bordered by the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west. It is bordered by six states: Wiscon ...

Indiana Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th ...

Missouri Missouri is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee): Iowa to the north, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee to the east, Arkansas t ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the O ...

and

Wisconsin Wisconsin () is a state in the upper Midwestern United States. Wisconsin is the 25th-largest state by total area and the 20th-most populous. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake M ...

.Locations
/ref> There are 34 associated Subway Restaurants,

Wendy's Wendy's is an American international fast food restaurant chain founded by Dave Thomas (1932–2002) on November 15, 1969, in Columbus, Ohio. Its headquarters moved to Dublin, Ohio, on January 29, 2006. As of December 31, 2018, Wendy's was ...

Dickey's Barbecue Pit Dickey's Barbecue Pit is an American family-owned barbecue restaurant chain based in Dallas, Texas, and is a subsidiary of Dickey's Capital Group. Since Travis Dickey established the restaurant in 1941, it has become the largest barbecue franchis ...

Church's Chicken Church's Texas Chicken is an American fast food restaurant chain that specializes in fried chicken and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. The chain was founded as Church's Fried Chicken To-Go by George W. Church Sr. on April 17, 1952, in San ...

Chester's International Chester's International, known as Chester's or Chester's Chicken, is a fried chicken quick-service restaurant chain based in Birmingham, Alabama, United States. W.O. Giles founded Chester's in October 1965 and adopted Chester the Chicken as the e ...

Burger King Burger King (BK) is an American-based multinational chain of hamburger fast food restaurants. Headquartered in Miami-Dade County, Florida, the company was founded in 1953 as Insta-Burger King, a Jacksonville, Florida–based restaurant ch ...

McDonald's McDonald's Corporation is an American multinational fast food chain, founded in 1940 as a restaurant operated by Richard and Maurice McDonald, in San Bernardino, California, United States. They rechristened their business as a hambur ...

, and other food franchises.

Dixie Truck Stop

In 2012 Road Ranger purchased, remodeled, and began operating the

Dixie Travel Plaza The Dixie Travel Plaza, previously known as the Dixie Truck Stop and Dixie Trucker's Home, is a large trucker and travel plaza located in McLean, Illinois, on Interstate 55. It was established by J.P. Walters and John Geske in 1928 on old US Rout ...

. Opened in 1928, the Dixie is one of the USA's original, and oldest truck stops.Road Ranger buys the Dixie

References

External links

Road Ranger Company Website
{{Trucking industry in the United States Companies based in Rockford, Illinois Privately held companies based in Illinois Economy of the Midwestern United States American companies established in 1984 Retail companies established in 1984 Restaurants established in 1984 Gas stations in the United States Truck stop chains Convenience stores of the United States 1984 establishments in Illinois