Savannah-based Parker’s Kitchen and its founder and CEO are making a difference in the communities they serve
Written by KEITH STRIGARO
HALF A CENTURY AGO, 21-year-old Greg Parker, fresh out of college, opened his first convenience store off I-95 in Midway, Georgia. While he had no way of knowing it at the time, Parker’s Midway store would become the cornerstone of the billion-dollar-plus company he and his team would build.
Now headquartered in Savannah, Parker’s Kitchen boasts more than 90 stores throughout Georgia and South Carolina and 1,600 employees. The company was named the 2020 Convenience Store of the Year by Convenience Store Decisions and recognized in 2024 as a USA Today “Top Workplace.”
As the company’s founder and CEO for the past 50 years, Parker has built one of the most successful convenience store chains in the country — and also one of the industry’s most generous.
A Force for Good
Over the past eight years, Parker’s Kitchen has donated more than $30 million to various causes, focusing its philanthropy on four pillars: education, hunger, health care and heroes.
“Giving back has been part of our DNA for years, and it is part of our culture. Our team loves it, our customers appreciate it, and we think it’s the right thing to do,” Parker says. “Our customers supporting Parker’s Kitchen allows us to support our communities. We want to be a force for positive change, for transformational change.”
And they want to fuel that change within their company footprint. “We want to give in areas that would directly affect the communities where we do business,” says Parker’s daughter, Olivia, who serves as the company’s outreach and communications manager.
For example, the Savannah area has a large population of veterans, so Parker’s recently partnered with the Wounded Warrior Project to help support local heroes. Round-up donations were made by customers at all of Parker’s retail stores. The company matched 25% of each customer donation.
“This was just our first round-up campaign with them, and we were able to give back over $300,000 with our Parker’s Community Fund match,” says Olivia. “All of that money stays right in our communities. It’s coming back to really impact the lives of injured veterans right here and their families.”
Advancing Education
In 2011, Parker’s Kitchen began its Fueling the Community program, supporting local public and private schools. The initiative donates a percentage of gas sold on the first Wednesday of each month, supplemented by the annual Fueling the Community Charity Golf Tournament. Since the program began, Parker’s has given more than $2 million to schools, including a $100,000 donation to the Savannah-Chatham County Public School System in 2023.
In 2018, Parker’s provided a $5 million donation to Georgia Southern University, the single largest gift in the university’s history, to create the Parker College of Business, which enrolls more than 4,000 students.
Reducing Hunger
Parker’s Kitchen recently partnered with America’s Second Harvest of Coastal Georgia, a nonprofit organization in Savannah, to help individuals who experience food insecurity. In 2023, the company gave $1 million to support the construction of the nonprofit’s new food bank and to feed people in need.
“Last year, we had a goal of feeding 2 million meals to hungry children, and that’s something I’m really, really proud of,” Parker says.
Improving Healthcare
When Parker needed emergency surgery at Memorial Hospital in 2013, he witnessed firsthand the emergency department’s need for a major renovation and expansion. At the time, Parker was serving on the hospital’s foundation board and thought, You know what? I can do something about this.
A year later, he gave a $1 million donation to endow the Parker’s Emergency and Trauma Center at Memorial, one of only six Level I trauma centers in the state.
Helping Homeless Women
In 2021, Parker’s partnered with Savannah’s Union Mission to create Parker’s House: A Home for Women. It supports unaccompanied women experiencing homelessness, many of whom have been abused, by helping them gain access to food, clothing, safety and shelter, and to develop a plan moving forward.
“When we went to the ribbon cutting, these two women who were part of the Parker’s House came up, started hugging me and said, ‘Thank you, Mr. Parker, thank you so much. I was on the street. I hadn’t had a shower in a week. I hadn’t had anything to eat. I was scared to death. I kept a knife with me. I have been abused.’’’
Stepping into the Future
Looking ahead, Parker’s Kitchen plans to open 100 new stores in the next four years. Their giving will grow as well. The Parker’s Community Fund has more than $20 million in it, and their goal is to increase that to $100 million.
Parker, however, will oversee this growth as executive chairman, not as CEO. After 50 years, he plans to step down as CEO in February 2025. But Parker doesn’t plan on going anywhere and will still be heavily involved with the company and its philanthropy.
“Being in business for 50 years, I have sowed my crops, and now I am harvesting my crops,” he says. “Now I’m in a position to be able to give back in profound ways.”
