Updated: Sunoco Purchases 14 PA Retail Locations from Shipley Stores

PHILADELPHIA -- Sunoco Inc. announced last night it would acquire leasehold interests in 14 retail locations in the central Pennsylvania counties of Adams, Cumberland, Lancaster, Perry and York. Commenting on Sunoco's purchase from Shipley Stores, Sunoco Chairman and CEO Lynn Elsenhans said, "Each location will be company operated and include an APlus convenience store. We have added approximately 215 sites to our retail network since the beginning of 2010."

Those 215 new locations include several store acquisitions in the states of Alabama, New York and New Jersey.

The 14 locations purchased from Shipley Stores are expected to be branded Sunoco and APlus by the end of this year. According to a Sunoco press release, Shipley Stores will narrow its focus on operating Pennsylvania Tom's Travel Centers and Arby's restaurants. "We continue to seek good sites from which to expand our Tom's brand and the Arby's foodservice operations throughout the state," said William Shipley, III, CEO of Shipley Group.

Sunoco also announced its fiscal second-quarter earnings last night. Elsenhans said the company posted strong earnings from its retail business, which along with its logistics segment are the "two growth areas of our business." "The $69 million earned in retail was a near-record second-quarter performance and resulted from the decline of wholesale gasoline prices that expanded profits," she said during Sunoco's conference call.

The story was different for the entire company as a whole however. Unlike most petroleum giants, Sunoco's net earnings fell for the quarter ending June 30. The company lost $125 million for the quarter, compared to a profit of $145 million during the same period in 2010.

Sunoco attributed the loss to $294 million in one-time special items, including an $118 million loss stemming from the sale of a chemicals manufacturing plant here. If not for all of the one-time items, Sunoco said it would have turned a profit of about $48 million for its latest quarter.