Bill Krause

The founder of an Iowa-based convenience store chain has died.

In 1959 Bill Krause and his father-in-law went into business together, then in 1963 they began selling staples like milk, bread and eggs at their gas station in Hampton, Iowa – becoming pioneers of what is now known as a convenience store.

The enterprise grew into the Kum & Go convenience store chain, with more than 400 stores in 11 states.

Krause, who graduated from the University of Iowa, was the manager of the 1957 Hawkeye football team that won the Rose Bowl. He’s been a major benefactor for the university and had a variety of other business interests, including Liberty Bank.

Governor Terry Branstad issued a statement this afternoon, calling Krause “a great Iowa entrepreneur” who “always had a smile on his face” and “an upbeat attitude.”

Krause died this morning at his home in West Des Moines. He was 78.

According to the Kum & Go, the chain now has 4000 employees and serves 400,000 customers daily. It is the fifth-largest “privately-held, company-operated” convenience store chain in the U.S.

A company based in northwest Iowa is celebrating its 100th anniversary by offering 100 wishes. Dave Smetter is a spokesman for Wells Enterprises, makers of Blue Bunny Ice Cream. “What we decided and was important early on was we wanted to do something that wasn’t just self-serving for us,” Smetter says.

The company has teamed up with the Make-A-Wish Foundation and to grant 100 children who have been diagnosed with a serious disease, the opportunity to have their wish come true. “We kind of came up with the idea when somebody simply said, ‘what do you do on a birthday?’ Well, you close your eyes, make a wish, and blow out a candle,” Smetter said. “So, the light bulb moment was there and we decided to seek out Make-A-Wish and tie the 100 years to 100 wishes.”

The Wells Blue Bunny / Make-A-Wish partnership launched in April, with just over 30 wishes granted thus far. Smetter notes that Make-A-Wish is handling all of the details concerning which children are granted wishes. Wells Blue Bunny is hosting ice cream parties at each “wish event.”

One of highlights of the Wells Blue Bunny 100th anniversary year-round celebration started Wednesday and wraps up today in LeMars: Ice Cream Days. LeMars, officially designated as “The Ice Cream Capital of the World” in 1994, has been the home to Wells Enterprises since the company’s founding by Fred H. Wells, Jr., in 1913.

by Dennis Morrice, KLEM, and Pat Curtis, Radio Iowa

The Ankeny-based convenience store chain Casey’s General Stores reports earnings for the fiscal year ending April 30th at $111-million, down 5.3% from 2012. The company’s chief financial officer, Bill Walljasper, says an adjustment in cigarette prices and a turnaround in the weather is part of the reason for the performance.

“Favorable weather a year ago in the fourth quarter allowed the company to achieve the highest quarterly same-store sales in the past five years, unfortunately this year during the same period we experienced unfavorable weather resulting in a slight decrease in same-store sales within the grocery and general merchandise category,” Walljasper told shareholders in a conference call today.

The company also had $3.5-million worth of unrecoverable accounts. For the fourth quarter, Casey’s posted net income of $23.3-million, or 60-cents a share. Walljasper has high hopes for the coming year, in part because of more stores staying open around-the-clock.

“Currently, about 550 of our stores are now open 24 hours. In fiscal 2014 we plan to convert another 100 stores to a 24-hour format,” Walljasper says. “We typically experience same store customer count double that of our store base resulting in a 20-to-30 percent lift in inside sales from a store converted to this format.”

Casey’s reports total gallon sales of gas were up four-percent for the fiscal year with an average margin of 15-point-two cents a gallon. The company operates more than 1,700 stores in 14 states and has set a goal of building or acquiring 70 to 105 stores over the next fiscal year.

Iowa home sales and prices rose again in the month of May. Don Marple is president of the Iowa Association of Realtors, which released its latest housing trends report Wednesday at a board of directors meeting in Moravia.

“Home sales rose another 10-percent from last year at this time,” Marple said. “An additional 369 more homes sold this May than last year, for a total of 3,906 homes sold in the month of May.”

The average sale price for an Iowa home purchased last month was $161,962. That marks a 6.9% increase over May 2012. One concern for Iowa’s housing market is the statewide inventory of homes for sale, which decreased 11.2% from last year.

However, Marple notes new active listings increased by 10% — with nearly 6,000 new homes placed on the market in May compared to April. Homes were on the market an average of 94 days last month, down from an average of 103 days a year earlier.