by John Keller | Sep 26, 2016 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Pricing Technology, Industry News
Skyline Products, a leading electronic price sign manufacturer, announced today the launch of its new software feature, PriceAdvantage Sign Diagnostics. This robust software makes it easier, faster, and more efficient for customers to remotely manage the health and price accuracy of their signs from a headquarters location.
“We’re incredibly excited to make remote sign diagnostics available to all our customers,” said Chip Stadjuhar, CEO of Skyline Products, “Our feedback method is by far the most robust on the market and now our customers can remotely access each of their signs from their headquarters office. It provides an extraordinary amount of control and confidence.”
Skyline has led the industry in powerful, full-loop feedback and diagnostic technology for years, giving customers the ability to receive critical information about their signs using an on-site handheld device. Skyline’s feedback feature set is designed to ensure a scroll or LED price sign is functioning properly and displaying the correct price at all times.
PriceAdvantage Sign Diagnostics makes it possible for customers to harness this information not only through their in-store handheld device, but remotely through PC-based software installed at headquarters. Remote access to these diagnostic and feedback features will now allow customers to better manage sign maintenance across all their locations, while allowing in-store staff to focus on the customer.
PriceAdvantage Sign Diagnostics will now be included with every new Skyline price sign, and is available to any existing Skyline price sign with a low-cost hardware upgrade.
by John Keller | Sep 20, 2016 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Pricing Strategy, Industry News
The Colonial Pipeline leak last week continues to impact supplies in the Southeastern United States, especially in Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, North Carolina and South Carolina. According to AAA, Georgia fuel prices rose $.05 per gallon overnight, but consumers report increases of $.20 per gallon. Alabama Governor Robert Bentley said Monday that gas prices in parts of Alabama rose 20 cents over the weekend, but the governor says he didn’t consider that price gouging. North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper on Monday urged North Carolina consumers to report gas prices that seem unreasonably high; over 400 consumers have filed complaints.
Some chains are without fuel in specific areas. A QuikTrip spokesman reported 21 of the 37 stores in the Charlotte, North Carolina area were out of unleaded gas Monday afternoon. In metro Atlanta, more than 60 of the 131 QuikTrip stores were also out of unleaded gas Monday afternoon. QuikTrip is keeping a list on its website of stores in both markets that have gas available.
On that page, QuikTrip writes “Due to supply issues caused by a major pipeline break in the Southeast, several stores are currently out of Regular and Premium Unleaded gasoline. The stores listed below DO have gasoline. Please note we are doing our best to keep this up to date, however this is a very dynamic situation. We apologize if the list below is inaccurate.”
What does this mean from a fuel price management perspective? Four things:
- More than ever it’s critical to keep a close watch on how the competition is priced, since market pricing can change multiple times a day.
- Executing new prices to the street, sometimes multiple times a day in order to keep up with market conditions, is vital.
- Maintaining a complete fuel pricing audit trail for every location, especially comparing prices to the competition, is important if the government ever makes an accusation of price gouging.
- When comparing this time period to previous and future years, it’s important to mark these days as a time when there was a supply crunch. These extraordinary circumstances must be taken into consideration when comparing volumes and margins, since they’re likely to be anything but normal. It is these kinds of special events that can wreak havoc on economic models.
PriceAdvantage makes it easy to track market price moves, and to execute new prices to the street in a hurry. PriceAdvantage reports make quick order of providing audit trails if the government comes knocking. And in the PriceAdvantage analysis views, it’s easy to see notes that you can enter to designate these days as being out of the ordinary.
These are the days when a PriceAdvantage system pays for itself many times over.
by John Keller | Sep 13, 2016 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Pricing Technology, Fuel Software
The PriceAdvantage team is excited to announce the general availability of PriceAdvantage version 2016.2. Highlights of this new release include a new Fuel Profit Analysis view, the configurability of the browser interface, and numerous usability improvements. All of these ideas came directly from PriceAdvantage customers.
This is our third major release so far this year. The PriceAdvantage development team uses Agile software best practices to rapidly build and deliver iterative releases throughout the year, always staying in close contact with the latest needs of our customers.
Please contact your Account Representative, or anyone on our Support team, to learn more about this new release, to schedule a demonstration, and to arrange for an upgrade.
by John Keller | Jun 3, 2016 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Pricing Technology
The PriceAdvantage team is excited to announce the general availability of PriceAdvantage version 2016.1. Highlights of this new release include the ability to set a future price change from additional areas of the product, Market View in the browser, and numerous usability improvements. All of these ideas came directly from PriceAdvantage customers.
This is our second major release so far this year. The PriceAdvantage development team uses Agile software best practices to rapidly build and deliver iterative releases throughout the year, always staying in close contact with the latest needs of our customers.
Please contact your Account Representative, or anyone on our Support team, to learn more about this new release, to schedule a demonstration, and to arrange for an upgrade.
by John Keller | May 7, 2016 | Customer News, Fuel Price Management, Fuel Price Optimization, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Pricing Strategy, Fuel Pricing Technology, Fuel Software
In the May 6, 2016 financial report, PriceAdvantage customer CST Brands reported that Gross Profit on fuel sales improved to $75 million from $63 million in the same quarter 2015.
Kim Lubel, Chairman and CEO of CST Brands said: “We showed continued strength in fuel gross profits in the U.S., as a result of a favorable fuel margin environment and our continued fuel pricing optimization initiatives.”
We at PriceAdvantage are proud to be a key part of how CST Brands executes on those fuel pricing optimization initiatives. CST Brands has been using PriceAdvantage for pricing all U.S. stores since 2012.
by John Keller | Feb 29, 2016 | Customer News, Fuel Price Management, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Pricing Strategy, Fuel Pricing Technology, Fuel Software, PriceAdvantage
The PriceAdvantage team would like to welcome BellStores as our newest customer and partner. BellStores operates 55 convenience stores throughout Ohio.
BellStores selected PriceAdvantage so that BellStores fuel analysts can directly drive fuel price changes based on intimate knowledge of the market and BellStores corporate strategies. By establishing pre-defined store-specific strategies, BellStores can streamline and automate price changes to their VeriFone POS systems, pumps, and electronic gas price signs – allowing the fuel retailer to execute faster, more informed price changes.
Like most PriceAdvantage customers, BellStores selected the SaaS offering in the cloud for the low upfront cost, ease of implementation, and the maintenance and infrastructure cost benefits.
Doug Combs, Vice President at BellStores said “To remain competitive, we needed to replace the time-consuming manual processes of collecting competitive data and communicating new prices. PriceAdvantage will help us streamline and automate competitive surveys and posting new prices. And the fact that I can do this from my phone or tablet is really exciting.”
Welcome BellStores – we look forward to our ongoing partnership!
