Hiway Mart A Large Part of Clearwater Community

Today, Hiway Mart is a staple of the Clearwater community and the only place to buy gas in town.

Rewind 20 years ago, when the two gas stations in Clearwater closed due to regulations requiring upgraded tanks. The town was left without a place to gas up. 

Joe and Carol Thiele didn’t like the idea of a town with no place to purchase gas, so they started tossing ideas of what they could do to solve the problem.

“This lot happened to be available for sale,” Joe Thiele said.  “I guess we kicked around the idea of a convenience store in our town.”

Thiele said he thought it would be a good addition to the town and the community agreed.
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“We got some positive feedback about that,” Joe Thiele explained.  “And we had it in our heads that we were going to give it a try.”

Joe Thiele currently owns an electrical business, so a gas station and convenience store was all new territory for him.

The Thieles didn’t let that stop them, however. Construction started in the fall of 1998 and only months later, in February of 1999, Hiway Mart opened its doors for the first time. 

“It was a journey. It was hard for a couple years,” Carol Thiele explained.  “It was a lot of hours and stuff. But we are very blessed with our help, our employees are awesome.”

Throughout the years, Hiway Mart has switched from Texaco gas to Shell. Last month, the gas station switched from Shell to Sinclair.

“We were out here by ourselves and Sinclair came along with a good credit card program, we think it is good. I like their imaging and they made a good proposal financially for us,” Joe Thiele said. “And, we like dinosaurs.”

Carol Thiele agreed that the switch was a natural choice for them. 

“Sinclair is much more family oriented,” she said. “It’s a family owned small-town business and has a credit card for customers and that was important too.”

In their years of owning the gas station, the Thieles have always made decisions based on what is best for the community and the customers.

“It’s been a good fit for our community and we feel like we offer something that the community needs,” Joe Thiele said. “And anybody that is maybe looking to move to our community would say, ‘Hey, a convenience store is kind of one necessary thing we need in our town.’ ”

In the years to come, the Thieles hope that a young couple might be interested in continuing the store for the community.

“At some point we will look at moving on to something else and having somebody else step in and continue on what we started there,” Joe Thiele said.

Joe and Carol credit the success of the store to their employees and to the community, for
which they are thankful.

​“It’s given us a great opportunity to meet a lot of different people with this business and make some friends,” Joe Thiele said.  “And it’s been a real positive thing for us.”