by John Keller | Mar 20, 2014 | Fuel Price Management Solutions, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Pricing Technology, Fuel Software
The PriceAdvantage team is pleased to announce the first new release of the year, version 2014.1. This is yet another release based on close collaboration with our customers. See the following list for some highlights.
1. The average retail fuel price for Regular Unleaded displays at the top of the Fuel Pricing view and All Stores web page, allowing you to quickly see the average Unleaded retail fuel price for any market you are viewing.
2. Hover over the Replacement Margin and see the rack cost and import date, so you can be certain the displayed margins are current and up to date.
3. Maps display the Regular Unleaded price for stores and competitors without having to click the pushpin, allowing you to see at a glance your price relative to the price of your competitors, and quickly know whether or not your current prices are in-line with your strategies.
4. Optionally set the retail sales tax for each store and include that percentage in the dynamic calculation of replacement margins when playing what-if pricing scenarios.
The feedback from our customers is that version 2014.1 continues to raise the bar in our easy to use interface. We take great pride in making fuel software that offers our customers a highly intuitive user interface, and we will continue to focus on that as a strategic advantage throughout 2014.
In 2013 we released five versions of PriceAdvantage, and we’re off to a great start in 2014. Stay tuned for more exciting software releases from us this year, and as always, please contact me at johnkeller@skylineproducts.com with any suggestions you’d like to see in a new version.
by John Keller | Mar 14, 2014 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Software, Industry News, Retail Fuel Margins
The latest OPIS report shows that average retail fuel margins across the US dipped slightly this week. The average retail fuel margin average now stands at $0.145 per gallon, down $0.012 per gallon. The year to date retail fuel margin average is $0.159. The six week average is $0.148 per gallon, down for the fourth consecutive week.
The equivalent day this time last year saw average retail fuel margins at $0.218 per gallon. Still, even with margins that high for this specific week last year, the year to date margins for 2013 at this point in time were $0.151 per gallon, so average retail fuel margins this year are up $0.008 compared to 2013.
Last year retail fuel margins remained flat to finish off the quarter. Hopefully history will repeat itself and we’ll see a strong finish to 2014 Q1 margins and remain at the $0.159 level.
by John Keller | Mar 13, 2014 | Customer News, Fuel Price Management Solutions, Fuel Price Optimization, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Software
It’s interesting to mine retail fuel information from financial results of publicly held c-store companies. For example, take a look at the numbers achieved by CST Brands and compare them to Susser for the 2013 fiscal year.
Go beyond the store count, and the fact that CST Brands is managing nearly twice as many stores. Zero in on the specifics of gallons per store and gross margin in cents per gallon. Then extrapolate the average fuel profit per store in 2013. The results are displayed in the table below.
| | Stores | Gallons Sold | Gallons/Store | Gross Margin (CPG) | Average Profit Per Store in 2013 |
| CST Brands | 1,036 | 1,889,565,580 | 1,823,905 | $0.140 | $255,347 |
| Susser | 561 | 936,232,000 | 1,668,863 | $0.114 | $190,250 |
| | | | | Difference | $65,096 |
Not only is CST Brands out performing on fuel volumes, but on fuel margins as well.
These results lead to the question, what is CST Brands doing so right? Certainly one answer has to be that CST Brands has been using PriceAdvantage as their retail fuels software for over one year now, and achieving great results.
As one PriceAdvantage customer put it “It helps when you have PriceAdvantage to manage stores!”
by John Keller | Mar 13, 2014 | Customer News, Fuel Software
The PriceAdvantage team would like to extend a warm family welcome to Speedy Q Markets, our latest partner and customer. Speedy Q Markets is the convenience store business under the umbrella of By-Lo Oil Company.
Speedy Q Markets successfully implemented a pilot program using PDI as their back-office software, and VeriFone Sapphire as their POS. This PriceAdvantage implementation is yet another one in the cloud. It is interesting to note that PriceAdvantage implementations in the cloud now outnumber implementations on-premise behind corporate firewalls.
Speedy Q Markets needed a solution that would allow them to remain competitive in markets where prices are changing multiple times a day. According to Kyle Lawrence, President of Speedy Q Markets, “We were quite impressed with how easy the PriceAdvantage software and the Skyline team was to work with. They got us exactly what we needed”.
Speedy Q Markets compete across the thumb region of Michigan. Their parent, the By-Lo Oil Company, has been family owned and operated since 1962.
Welcome Speedy Q Markets – we look forward to our mutual ongoing success together!
by John Keller | Mar 5, 2014 | Fuel Price Management Solutions, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Pricing Technology, Fuel Software
When you are managing the volatile and highly competitive retail fuel business of today, you need the best near-real-time information you can get in order to gain a competitive advantage. But at many levels within the organization, the data is simply not readily available in near-real-time. And if this data is available, it is not presented in a meaningful way for managers of retail fuel to quickly see answers to their questions. For example, we have found that accounting reports at the end of the week, month and quarter fall far short of providing retail fuel managers what they need.
PriceAdvantage provides 26 industry-specific reports and SNAP analytics designed specifically with the fuel manager in mind, equipping him with the insight needed to make the strategic decisions that rise above the competition. Our integrations with back office partners like PDI, Pinnacle, and TelaPoint make data retrieval and data presentation a core competency of PriceAdvantage.
For example, the PriceAdvantage Volume Correlation report allows the fuel manager to see the correlation of in-store sales with fuel sales. View market trends graphically and in heat maps so you can quickly identify any strategy changes happening in the market landscape. Use scorecard reports to see the store execution of fuel pricing responsibilities, allowing the fuel pricing team to make pricing decisions hour to hour, and equipping executives with the insight they need to make strategic market decisions.
When you manage your retail fuel business with the PriceAdvantage solution, you are working with a partner who can make you successful with the largest and most price-sensitive product category: FUEL.
by John Keller | Mar 5, 2014 | Customer News, Fuel Pricing Software, Fuel Pricing Strategy, Fuel Pricing Technology, Fuel Software
PriceAdvantage, a division of Skyline Products, announced today that J & H Oil has chosen PriceAdvantage SMART Fuel Pricing as their fuel price management solution.
J & H Oil is running PriceAdvantage in the cloud, eliminating the need for their IT resources to maintain their system.
“We have been searching for ways to improve our overall pricing process, including speeding up survey collections, and eliminating price change errors. After a thorough comparison and evaluation process, including a successful pilot, we are excited to select PriceAdvantage as our retail fuels software. We elected to include PriceAdvantage because we believe it will allow us to understand market and store performance, adjust our strategies as needed, and give us the competitive edge,” said Craig Hoppen, President of J & H Oil.
“We are glad to have J & H as a cloud customer and to know that PriceAdvantage is already improving their retail fuels business,” said Chip Stadjuhar, CEO of Skyline Products. “PriceAdvantage is ideal for automating the retail fuels pricing process, and ensuring that the right price is at the right store, all the time”, Stadjuhar added.
