Tom Love, who co-founded Love’s Travel Stops & Country Stores with his wife in 1964 and grew the company to a family of businesses with more than 600 travel plazas in 42 states, died Tuesday. He was 85.
“Tom Love was a man of conviction who never wavered from the principles of honesty and integrity in the 59 years he spent developing the company he started with his wife, Judy,” Love’s President Shane Wharton said in a news release. “These tenets still guide our company and will as we move forward.”
Love’s remains privately held even as rivals Pilot Co. has become majority owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway and TravelCenters of America transitions from public ownership to being part of BP.
Love, executive chair of the company, died in his hometown of Oklahoma City. He is survived by his wife of 62 years, Judy, his children Frank, Greg, Jenny and Laura, nine grandchildren and two great-grandchildren and two more on the way.
Born in 1937 in Oklahoma City, Love attended St. Gregory’s Preparatory School in Shawnee, Oklahoma, and St. John’s University in Minnesota before enlisting in the U.S. Marine Corps in 1954. He married Judy in 1960.
In 1964, the couple used $5,000 to lease an abandoned service station in Watonga, a small rural town northwest of Oklahoma City. From there the then-named Musket Corp. opened 40 stores in eight years in western Oklahoma.
Combining convenience stores and self-serve gasoline
Love established the country store concept, combining existing business models for grocery and convenience stores with a self-service gas station. In 1972, Love’s country store in Guymon, Oklahoma, became the nation’s first store to combine self-service gasoline and grocery items.
In 1981, Love’s opened its first travel stop on Interstate 40 in Amarillo, Texas. It catered to professional truck drivers and the motoring public. Throughout the decades, Love’s expanded its services to include hot and fresh food items, truck maintenance and showering facilities.
The Love’s Family of Companies has grown to include businesses focused on truck maintenance, logistics, commodity supply and alternative energies. It employs 39,000 people.
Love’s enthusiasm for sports led the company to partner with his hometown NBA team, the Oklahoma City Thunder. Love’s logo is displayed on the front left shoulder of Thunder players’ jerseys.
Love’s boasts more than 430 truck service centers, which include Speedco and Love’s Truck Care locations. Together, they make up the nation’s largest network of oil change, preventive maintenance and total truck care locations with 1,500 maintenance bays and 1,200 emergency roadside vehicles. Love’s partners with Navistar International and Daimler Truck North America.
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