Arie Kotler: Well, given the market that I mentioned, and given that, as I said, 40% of our stores are actually sitting in cities that are 20,000, — a population of 20,000 people or less, as you can imagine, in those areas, the consumer is looking for value, the consumer is looking for value. There is no question about that. And given that, given our size, and, you’re talking about an industry that 75% of the industry, almost, yeah, 75, 70%, 75% of the industry, it’s really small chain with 50 store or less, as you can imagine, very difficult for some of those small chains to implement the private label, very difficult for some of those small chains to basically to bring valuable items to the consumers. I think, given our size, and our economy of scale, that we know we have almost, we have over 1,400 stores going soon to over 1,500 stores, I think we have the size and the capability and the merchandising team, of course that work around the clock to make sure that we bring valuable item to those — basically, to consumer.
And by the way, that’s the reason I keep saying that. That’s the reason that Q4 was such a strong Q, with other item other than cigarettes. And I can, be very pleased and tell you right now that the trend right now continue to be stronger than basically than Q4 when it comes to those categories. So as long as you have the size and economy of scale, and you have the merchandising team that will sell those products. I mean, this is what the consumer is looking right now. You’re absolutely correct, the consumer is looking for value. The brand is not relevant anymore. The value is very, very important, given, basically where we are at the moment.
Karru Martinson : Thank you very much. Appreciate it.
Arie Kotler: Thank you.
Operator: Thank you. The next question is coming from William Reuter of Bank of America. Please go ahead.
William Reuter : Hi, you mentioned that M&A pipeline continues to be strong, I guess is there anything you can share with us about the attributes in terms of how big these are? Are they the same kind of general size that historical acquisitions have been? And I guess I’m talking on the retail side here?
Arie Kotler: I think nothing really changed in terms of the size. I mean, it’s the same size as you guys saw, we basically did four acquisition, three of them involve retail. So I don’t think anything’s changed in terms of size. I think what we’re seeing over here, and that’s coming back to what I was basically saying since 2020, we are a very, very, very disciplined purchaser, very disciplined purchaser. And you guys didn’t see double digit multiples, when it comes to our acquisition. We still basically signed 24 acquisition close 22, getting ready to close another two. We grow our store base very nicely over here. And I think what you’re going to see right now, it’s a lot of people that I don’t want to say overpaid, but maybe paid a higher multiples.
As interest rates continue to rise, I think what we’re going to see is that some of those folks are going to have to try to refinance. So they’re going to try to sell their businesses given that they’re not going to be able to refinance in this interest rate environment. And that’s why — and it’s become a little bit more difficult to operate a medium small size chain, versus what we saw in basically before the pandemic.
William Reuter : Okay, and then — that’s helpful. And then just as one follow up, you talked about how 60% of your stores are in relatively rural locations or smaller population locations. Historically, there have not been many large operators that have been building stores there. Have you seen that change at all over the last year or two, given that profitability of outside the store fuel margins have been so strong?
