Imperial Oil has confirmed that a service station planned for the vacant lot across from Tim Hortons will sell Esso-branded products as well as have a convenience store and a food service outlet.
“We can share that construction is currently scheduled to begin this spring and is expected to be completed within six months,” said Imperial official Keri Scobie from Edmonton last week, adding that more details will be released as they become available.
A development permit by the District of Houston has been granted for the location and a building permit is now needed to allow construction to begin.
While the service station will sell Imperial’s Esso products, Imperial won’t be owning the development.
That’s because it sold off its retail sites in 2016 and now contracts out to third parties to be the operators of locations selling Esso products.
In this circumstance, Husky Retail is to be the third party operator, said Scobie.
“This is an Esso-branded site with Esso products and loyalty programs, just operated by third-party,” she said.
Husky Retail itself is an entity within Husky Energy and in a deal first announced last fall, Husky Energy and Cenovus, both headquartered in Calgary, agreed to combine operations in a stock exchange worth more than $4 billion. That transaction become official last week.