In my town, Shell price is cheapest (so long queue outside Shell pumps in peak hours) and BP has steepest price (hardly any cars in BP pumps at anytime).
All other pumps i.e. supermarkets, Total, Texaco are in between.
I either buy from supermarket (as it is just 5 min walk from my home) or Shell (if passing by).
So who buys from BP? The only time I have to buy from BP is at Motorways when I'm running low on fuel and have no choice.
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>> So who buys from BP? The only time I have to buy from BP is
>> at Motorways when I'm running low on fuel and have no choice.
People who are prepared to pay more for the convenience of using the nearest petrol station and/or having a shorter wait at the pump?
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I was facinated by this in the Orlando a couple of months ago - petrol varied by 30c per US galllon from $2.79 to $3.09.
Yet the activity level on the forecourt seemed to bear no relation to the price, and, percentage wise, that's a big difference.
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>> I was facinated by this in the Orlando a couple of months ago - petrol
>> varied by 30c per US galllon from $2.79 to $3.09.
>>
>> Yet the activity level on the forecourt seemed to bear no relation to the price,
>> and, percentage wise, that's a big difference.
A lot of people are fairly price insensitive on smaller purchases.
I think my Mondeo has a 70 litre tank (could be wrong about that), if I am only sticking in half a tank I reckon that is about 9 US gallons which would be about $2.70 (£1.75) difference.
When you compare that to a lot of daily expenses, a lot of people just can't be bothered to go out of their way, or queue for another 5 minutes.
It's probably especially the case if they don't drive a lot, because then the extra per day could be very small.
EDIT: For example, if you did 10,000 miles a year, at 30 mpg, that would be 333 gallons or 400 US gallons. At an extra 30 cents a gallons that is $120 a year, or about £80, which is 22p a day. A lot of people would just rather have the convenience.
Last edited by: SteelSpark on Wed 14 Jul 10 at 15:22
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>> EDIT: For example, if you did 10,000 miles a year, at 30 mpg, that would
>> be 333 gallons or 400 US gallons. At an extra 30 cents a gallons that
>> is $120 a year, or about £80, which is 22p a day. A lot of
>> people would just rather have the convenience.
and assumes of course you buy ALL the fuel in 10,000 miles at 30c a gallon more.
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Filled up at local BP on Saturday. I have little idea of petrol prices these days, but that doesn't matter too much as I don't use the car a great deal. It's also convenient, and they don't charge for air.
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>> they don't charge for air
Neither do Sainsbury and Shell in my town. Also, I keep a portable air compressor in car for that :)
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>>Neither do Sainsbury and Shell in my town.
Most in my area do charge, although not Sainsbury. Tesco was free until a few months ago.
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>>The only time I have to buy from BP is
>> at Motorways when I'm running low on fuel and have no choice.
>>
A few seconds planning would solve that one.
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I buy BP Ultimate all the time. The nearest fuel stations to me are all BP, and I don't do enough mileage to worry myself to sleep over fuel prices. It's all expensive, and it won't be getting any less so. But I'll probably look back in 5 years time and realise it was cheap.
Last edited by: corax on Wed 14 Jul 10 at 16:34
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BP in Oxford last week was 2p cheaper than the Texaco and Tesco garage up the road. Had it not been for the 5p off voucher I had for Tesco I would have pulled into BP.
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Not sure if its still the case, but many years ago I had a fuel card from my employer. The price was fixed wherever you filled up, and was often less than the pump price
Last edited by: mikeyb on Wed 14 Jul 10 at 17:40
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I live in an area where all the dozen or so petrol stations charge exactly the same (including the supermarkets), and that price is about 5p a litre higher than you pay outside the area in any direction.
I haven't bought petrol or diesel in my town for about 18 months.
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>>>> I either buy from supermarket (as it is just 5 min walk from my home)
>>
Don't you find that it is more convenient to drive to the supermarket when you need fuel??
;-)
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We used to have a BP station and a Q8 opposite each other.The Q8 closed because the BP was taking all the trade and people were apparently happy to pay another twentypence a gallon..
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I try to buy at Co-ops - swipe my card, get dividend and pay by Co-Op credit card and get 1 percent cashback ! (I am a skinflint really)
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>> (I am a skinflint really)
I am mighty unimpressed with the Shell reward card. 1 point for every litre, but they'll send me a vpower card soon and that'll change it to 2 points for every litre. Sounds good.
Until you realise it takes 500 litres on a yellow card or 250 litres on a red card to buy the same number of airmiles as you get for ~£112 worth of spend in tesco for clubcard vouchers.
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>> Until you realise it takes 500 litres on a yellow card or 250 litres on a red card to buy the
>> same number of airmiles as you get for ~£112 worth of spend in tesco for clubcard
>> vouchers.
Is that at the 60 miles for £2.50 rate. I get 80 miles still. A reason I've not stopped it and I am accumulating miles... and with BA not flying much from Manchester to Europe these days I am limited what to spend them on. I did buy two tickets plus some cash to Australia recently though.
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I tend to use Tesco for clubcard points and try to make use of the 5p/litre off deals. A local(ish) Shell is usually a bit cheaper but always has queues when I pass. And no point making a journey to save 1p/litre when it costs you more than that to get there and back.
Years ago my brother when working in the UK with a fuel card would use the garage with the deal he was collecting stamps/points for. Even if it was a drive. Top of his road (100 yards) was a Shell petrol station which he didn't use at the time.
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Back in my company car days, I always used to go out of my way to fill up at Tesco for the Clubcard points. We did very well out of it, especially as I was doing a full tank of diesel every 3-4 days typically. Sometimes more.
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>> Back in my company car days, I always used to go out of my way to fill up at Tesco for the Clubcard points.
>> We did very well out of it, especially as I was doing a full tank of diesel every 3-4 days typically. Sometimes more.
Taxi, BP or Sainsburys, Reward points, every day, very very well :-)
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The thing that fascinates me is the "no name" brands a few miles a way from the big name brand where the "no name" brand is always HUGELY more expensive than the "normal" stuff. Who buys from them? But they survive and you see them across the country.
JH
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But they survive and you see them
>> across the country.
Many of them have account customers as the bulk of their trade, and there's also the local loyalty which is still a factor in rural areas.
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I try to buy all my diesel for the Fabia Diesel in Gibraltar, where currently, the price hovers around an excessive 83.5p per litre! (Only three months ago it was a reasonable 63.5p per litre, so there has been a massive jump.)
(Price in Spain is around 1.10€ per litre)
There is a Morrison's Superstore there. It's the most profitable per sq. ft. of selling space in the entire group. See their food prices and you'll understand why - but I digress.
The Shell stations are usually a fraction cheaper than Morrison's but BP is ALWAYS much more expensive.
Odd, as ALL the stuff comes from the massive CEPSA refinery around 10 KM away across the border!
I refuse to fill up at Morrison's as they never have any gloves in the dispensers. The excuse - they get stolen! Their problem - not mine - so how do other stations manage?
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Who buys fuel at higher price? - SteelSpark
