Who Owns Carroll Gas Stations?

Two entrepreneurs, Benson Phelps and Carroll Faye, teamed up to open a small coal and wood delivery company in Baltimore in 1907. The business saw success in its early years, expanding rapidly over its first couple of decades. Faye decided to move on to other ventures and sold his stake in the business to Phelps, but the company continued to use Faye's first name as its brand. The Carroll Independent Fuel Company began selling oil in the 1930s under the guidance of Phelps, and it never stopped. Today, drivers can still buy fuel from the same company, although they'll now recognize it as Carroll Motor Fuels.

The Carroll network of gas stations might have grown significantly over its century-plus of trading, but its ownership structure has remained consistent. It's still an independent, family-owned business, with various members of the Phelps family at the helm. John Phelps serves as the company's CEO and President, while Richard B. Phelps III holds the title of Executive Vice President alongside C. Howard Phelps. Several more Phelps family members hold leadership roles.

Carroll isn't the only gas station chain that has remained family owned since its inception. The Love's chain of gas stations is also still owned by members of its founding family, and it has risen to become one of America's largest privately owned companies.

Alongside its own-brand gas stations, Carroll Independent Fuel also operates stations under various other names. The East Coast chain's network includes stations that use Sunoco branding, which is most famously associated with the NASCAR Cup Series. Other locations are branded as BP gas stations, with Carroll working with the British-owned oil company since 2006.

In 2012, Carroll Independent Fuel also acquired High's, a Baltimore-based chain of convenience stores. In an interview with the Baltimore Business Journal, Executive Vice President Howard Phelps said that the company realized that "competition on the gasoline retail side was transitioning to convenience," and that Carroll wanted to "to go toe to toe" with rivals like Sheetz and Wawa.

The Carroll network continues to grow, with the company acquiring seven new sites in 2022. The new locations helped develop its network outside the company's home state of Maryland, with Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania all seeing new Carroll-operated locations launched.