KP Market Launches Loyalty App Built by Rovertown

KP Market soft-launched its first mobile app on Oct. 19, developed with software company Rovertown, as the convenience banner lays the groundwork for a loyalty program it hopes to have running early next year. Barry Ahern, the company's chief retail and people officer, confirmed the rollout by email.

The app debuted internally — employees and their families got it first — before KP Market's front-line teams began promoting it to customers last week. A full rollout is expected this week. The app is now available on both the App Store and Google Play.

Notably, KP Market doesn't actually have a loyalty program yet. The company is still shopping for a vendor and wants one in place early next year, Ahern said. The app, in other words, is arriving before the program it's meant to serve.

What does the app actually do?

The feature list is longer than the banner's one-year track record:

• App-only offers and scratch-and-win promotions
• A game room
• Company news
• Geofencing that pushes offers exclusive to a nearby store
• A link to KP Market's careers page
• An employee-only section with information and worker-specific offers

There are carrots for adoption, too. Users get a free offer simply for downloading the app, plus another one on their birthday. Ahern said the company also plans to run offers in November tied to special days and weeks — pumpkin-flavored urgency, presumably, at no extra charge.

Why an app before a loyalty program?

KP Market is the convenience-store banner of Kayrouz Petroleum, a Massachusetts company, and it debuted roughly a year ago. The banner spans both c-stores and travel centers, and it has been busy on the partnership front: KP Market recently teamed up with fellow Massachusetts business Marylou's Coffee, a quick-service chain, to put a coffee shop inside one of its c-stores.

The app push also fits a broader pattern. KP Market is the latest among many retailers this year to bulk up their digital presence through apps, loyalty and delivery — a crowded queue, and one where a one-year-old banner needs every download it can get.

For a young banner without a loyalty program, the geofencing and birthday offers give KP Market a data-and-engagement engine it can plug a vendor-built program into once the contract is signed. If that early-2026 timeline holds, the retailer will have spent the back half of this year building the storefront and the front half of next year stocking it.