If you’ve ever stopped for food in a one-exit town along the freeway, there’s a good chance your choices primarily consisted of chips, beef jerky, and days-old sandwiches.
But what if convenience stores offered tasty, fresh food cooked in-house instead of salty snacks or days-old sandwiches made off-site? That’s the vision of Danish food entrepreneur Daniel Baven, who is already changing the convenience store food landscape in his native Denmark.
His company, Noahs, is building a platform designed to turn retail locations into distributed food hubs powered by digital ordering, modular kitchens, and a rotating portfolio of food brands. The idea stems from Baven’s belief that traditional restaurants are struggling under the economics of delivery platforms, while retailers already possess many of the ingredients needed to participate in the digital food economy.
“The biggest opportunity in the market space is actually service stations and supermarkets because they all are looking for this new revenue driver and they’re all looking to digitize,” he said in a recent interview with The Spoon. “They have the staff, they have the space. Even many of them have a lot of equipment that can be utilized to actually access the digital food economy.”
According to Baven, Noahs provides both the infrastructure and the software layer that allows these retailers to operate multiple food concepts out of a single location. Baven often describes the system as something akin to a streaming service for restaurant brands.
“We’re building the Spotify of food,” he said. “We want to be the broker of great brands where we can slot in famous brands to the retailers.”
Like you, I’ve heard the term “Spotify for X” applied to dozens of startups, and I’m not sure it’s the best descriptor for restaurant concepts. That said, I do like the idea of switching out concepts to see which resonates within each market. The company provides a digital ordering stack with modular kitchen systems and a portfolio of food brands that can be swapped in and out depending on location and demand. Retailers can add concepts like pizza, tacos, or sandwiches with minimal operational changes.
In some cases, Baven says retailers can even run new food brands using existing equipment. “We have a chicken brand where most service stations already have the equipment to run it. So they don’t need any capex investment, and they can immediately go in and capture that sale,” he said.
Given changing consumer habits—particularly that younger generations are smoking and drinking less than their parents (alcohol and tobacco sales make up a large percentage of convenience store revenue)—as well as the rise of EVs, traditional revenue streams for convenience stores are in decline. Baven believes fresh food is the answer.
Noahs is already working with partners across Europe and expects significant expansion in the coming years. The company expects to have 600 locations by the end of 2026, mostly in Europe, but the company is eyeing a U.S. expansion within the next 12 months.
“We anticipate we would have at least around 600 locations by the end of ’26 using the Noah’s platform,” Baven said.
“I would say definitely sometime next year,” said Baven when asked when Americans might see Noahs-powered food on U.S. highways..
You can watch my complete interview with Daniel Baven below.
