Phila's Sunoco LP moving to Texas

UPDATED: Sunoco LP confirms that its boss Bob Owens, CEO of the gas-station and convenience store group once part of Philadelphia's old Sun Oil Co., is moving with his senior staff from Newtown Square to Dallas, home of his company's controlling owner, Energy Transfer Partners (ETP). Sunoco operates more than 850 retail store/gas stops and supplies thousands more.

Sunoco LP's move to Texas "allows some of our core corporate functions to operate from a region central to our expanding geographic footprint, and also close to our parent company's headquarters," spokesman Jeff Shields told me.  "Sunoco is a major player in our industry and is going to grow significantly" from its Texas home.

Owens "will be based at the Dallas office," along with "some of his senior staff and designated team members from various corporate functions," Shields added. The move follows a string of acquisitions by Sunoco LP since its 2014 merger with Texas-based Susser Holdings, which my Inquirer colleague Andrew Maykuth wrote about here.  The Corpus Christi Caller quoted Sunoco officials confirming the headquarters move to Dallas last November here. 

Sunoco LP and Sunoco Logistics, an oil, gas, fuels and chemicals transport and storage company that operates the Marcus Hook Industrial Complex and the Mariner pipeline projects, among other facilities, are publicly-traded companies controlled by ETP.

Both are based on fragments of the Pew family's once-vast Sun Oil group, which included pioneering Canadian Arctic oil exploration, refinery operations from Toleto and Tulsa to West Africa, and the vast former Sun Shipyard tanker-buiding facilities in Chester, among many other properties.

Sunoco Logistics, formerly based in Philadelphia, closed its offices at 1818 Market St. last fall and is now based in Newtown Square.

Sunoco's stores group had moved bosses and staff from offices in Philadelphia and Lester, Delaware County to the Newtown Square site in 2013 and initially made it headquarters for the stores group. The site accomodated 700 Sunoco employees, according to Steve Spaeder, senior vice president at Equus.

Around 450 Sunoco LP people now work there, plus another 100 for Sunoco Logistics, Shields told me.

Sunoco LP also plans to close an office in suburban Reading, Berks County, "in 2016 of 2017," Shields confirmed. "Some of the approximately 35 positions there are being transferred to Dallas, with others moving to the field."

The moves aren't done: Although "we expect to maintain a significant presence in Newtown Square" -- and in Corpus Christi and Houston, where Susser had offices-- "we will be asking some employees in these offices to relocate," Shields added.

The company is "still working on the exact numbers" who will remain in the Philadelphia area, he said. Sunoco LP will continue to be a tenant at Ellis Preserve and will continue "its comittment to the Delaware Valley" and the larger region, he added.

Besides Sunoco A+, Stripes and Laredo Taco locations, the company has acquired Aloha stores in Hawaii, QuikStops in South Texas and Circle K markets along the East Coast in recent years.