BREWER, Maine — Circle K, which is owned by Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc., is taking ownership of the convenience stores now operated by Dead River Co.

“We’re not closing them; we’re selling them,” Alan Dorr, who works from Dead River’s South Portland headquarters, said Thursday morning.

Dead River decided to get out of the convenience store business after about 40 years to better focus on selling home heating fuels and the installation and servicing of heating units, Deanna Sherman, a vice president for the company, told local media.

Circle K officials have agreed to offer jobs to many of the 300 or so employees at the 19 Maine stores that will change ownership, she said.

Circle K, launched in El Paso, Texas, in 1951, went through a mid-1980s bankruptcy and ownership changes before Couche-Tard of Laval, Quebec, stepped in during 2003 and acquired the Circle K chain from ConocoPhillips for $804 million.

Couche-Tard, which has more than 6,000 stores, is the largest independent convenience store operator in Canada and the second-largest on North America, surpassed only by 7-Eleven.

The Canadian company operates many of its stores in Canada under the brand name Couche-Tard, which is French for “goes to bed late” and features a winking owl on its signs, but also has stores all over North America operating under On the Run, Mac’s, Circle K and other names.

Couche-Tard is no stranger to Maine. The company signed a 20-year deal in 2008 with Saint John, New Brunswick’s Irving Oil Ltd. to operate 252 convenience stores in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Vermont and Canada under the Circle K name.

A message requesting comment made to the Circle K regional office in Chicago was not immediately returned Thursday.

The sale and switchover is scheduled to occur in December.

Reprinted with permission from the Bangor Daily News.