by John Keller | Nov 7, 2011 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Pricing Strategy, Industry News
The announcement today from Alon Brands Inc. saying they will end the 51-year-old FINA fuel brand and replace it with the brand ALON is a case in point of just how dynamic the retail fuel pricing market is. From a fuel price management and fuel pricing strategy perspective, fuel analysts will need to carefully monitor the market reaction to this fuel branding transition.
Fuel Price Management software like PriceAdvantage is critical for allowing fuel pricing analysts to navigate their way through this transition, by monitoring the daily fuel volumes imported from PDI, tracking the competitor pricing strategies in each market from store surveys and OPIS, and adjusting fuel pricing strategies to maintain optimized prices at every store.
by John Keller | Oct 27, 2011 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Pricing Strategy, Industry News
The Ball State Daily News reported a recent fuel price war between two c-stores racing each other to the basement. A new Phillips 66 store kicked things off with a grand opening celebration and a fuel price of $3.19 for regular. The BP station across the street lowered their price by $.10. The war was on, and each c-store kept dropping their fuel price by $.10 increments back and forth before settling on $2.19. For a brief time, the BP station was priced as low $1.99. The lines of cars to enter the c-stores got so long the local police department had to be called in to direct traffic. By 2pm, the BP store raised its price back to $3.19.
This is a great example of what happens when a fuels pricing strategy goes haywire. Once fuel prices get to be so out of whack with the market, abnormal traffic patterns ensue. From a fuel price management perspective, lesson learned is there is no substitute for fuel pricing analysts to use wisdom when setting optimized fuel prices. There’s no such thing as an easy button – the market is too dynamic to allow automation to run amok and take the place of human wisdom.
by John Keller | Oct 26, 2011 | Customer News, Fuel Price Management, Fuel Price Management Solutions, Fuel Price Optimization
CEFCO Convenience Stores has grown by approximately 60% this year. According to Brett Giesick, Chief Retail Officer quoted in today’s article in Convenience Store News, the reason why Fikes is able to grow so successfully is because of “having the right infrastructure.” Specificallly, Giesick cites their operations, marketing, and support teams for allowing CEFCO to achieve their planned growth.
The PriceAdvantage Fuels Price Management Solution is a key part of the infrastructure at CEFCO. Giesick and his team of Territory Managers use PriceAdvantage to carefully monitor the fuels volume sales of each store according to the latest daily import from PDI, compare it to fuels volume targets in a view with the latest competitor pricing trends, and from the same view send new fuel prices to each store. This allows CEFCO to execute fuel price changes according to their fuel price strategies in a fraction of the time it used to take with the fuel pricing solutions they had before PriceAdvantage.
True fuel price optimization can only be achieved through well executed fuel price strategies across the entire enterprise. And with PriceAdvantage, CEFCO is able to optimize their fuel prices, optimize fuel profits, and achieve their growth plans.
by John Keller | Oct 26, 2011 | Fuel Price Management, Industry News
According to an article from Cars.com and USA Today, the US Department of Transportation reports that travel on US roadways through August 2011 has reached the lowest levels since 2003. Specifically, travel in the month of August 2011 was down 1.7% from the same period in 2010, as low as August 2009 during the recession. Rural interstate travel decreased 2.7% while urban travel was down 0.5%. The Northeast region saw travel drop 2.2% in August, while in the West travel dropped 1.2%.
From a Fuel Price Management perspective, fuel pricing analysts need to be aware of this report as yet another data point indicating that the size of the fuels market is on the decline. That makes for more heated c-store competition for fewer fuel gallons sold, market conditions where only the strongest survive.
by John Keller | Oct 25, 2011 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Price Management Solutions, Fuel Price Optimization, Fuel Pricing Strategy
One of the components of fuel price management strategies is the public expectations of short term future trends in gas prices. Public expectations of gas prices are influenced by the most recent news articles. Today MSNBC.COM published an article setting expectations that gas prices will likely lower throughout the remaining months of the year. The article cites the US Energy Information Administration as saying gas prices should decrease through the beginning of the new year. Patrick DeHaan, Senior Petroleum Analyst at GasBuddy, is cited as saying he expects gas prices to possibly lower to $3.25 by the end of the year.
The article goes on to explain that fuel prices should lower due to decreased demand in the winter months, and the lower cost of winter fuel.
Obviously this article isn’t enough to base an entire fuel price management strategy on, but it is a key piece of information worthy of attention. Articles like these lead to drivers keeping an eye out for lower fuel prices, and to some degree asking what is taking so long for gas prices to lower.
by John Keller | Oct 10, 2011 | Customer News, Fuel Price Management, Fuel Pricing Software, PriceAdvantage
CEFCO Convenience Stores announced they have acquired two more c-store sites, this time in Collinsville and Marion Mississippi. This purchase follows on the heels of CEFCO’s acquisition of 69 stores in August. Once this acquisition is complete, CEFCO will operate a total of 194 convenience stores throughout Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas.
CEFCO uses PriceAdvantage fuel price management software solutions to handle all their retail fuel pricing. CEFCO also has Skyline electronic gas price signs that complete the closed loop fuel price management cycle from surveys, to fuel price optimization, to fuel price execution, to confirmation. The CEFCO PriceAdvantage implementation includes integration with VeriFone and Gilbarco POS systems, as well as their PDI system.
