by John Keller | Jun 14, 2012 | Fuel Price Management, Retail Fuel Margins
In the Casey’s fiscal report today, the company announced retail fuel margins were at $0.137 per gallon for the quarter, down nearly $0.02 per gallon from last year. But same store fuel gallons sold were up 2.5% over a year ago.
Corporate goals for 2013 include increasing same store fuel gallons sold by 1% with an average retail fuel margin of $0.14 per gallon.
From a fuel price management perspective, it’s clear as the c-store quarterly results come in that last quarter was a tough period for retail fuel margins. Some c-stores managed to weather the storm with solid fuel volume numbers while others did not fare so well.
This balancing act between retail fuel margins and fuel volumes continues to drive the need for a robust fuel price management system that allows you to analyze the market trends, deploy optimized fuel prices quickly, and confirm that the optimized retail fuel prices are really getting to the street.
by John Keller | Jun 12, 2012 | Fuel Price Management, Industry News
The US Energy Information Administration reported in their This Week In Petroleum report that in the first quarter of 2012, US drivers consumed 5% less gasoline than in the same quarter of 2007.
In the first quarter of 2007, US drivers consumed just over 9.0 million bbl/d of gasoline. In the five years since, consumption has fallen about 450,000 bbl/d to average less than 8.6 million bbl/d for the first quarter of 2012.
This is the third industry source, after OPIS and MasterCard, to report a decline in fuel consumption.
From a fuel price management perspective, this is yet another indication that the competition for retail fuel sales continues to be intense. Fuel Pricing Software systems are critical for c-stores to achieve their fuel volume goals, whether they be maintaining fuel levels year over year, or gaining market share.
by John Keller | Jun 12, 2012 | Industry News
Today the US Energy Information Administration reported in their Short-Term Energy Outlook that they predict retail fuel prices of unleaded regular fuel to average $3.60 per gallon for the April through September season of 2012. That’s a $0.19 drop from the US EIA prediction last month.
Overall for the entire 2012 year, the US EIA predicts unleaded regular fuel to average $3.56 per gallon. That would be a $.03 per gallon increase over the $3.53 per gallon average of 2011.
Earlier this week the US EIA reported the average fuel price for unleaded regular currently stands at $3.57 per gallon.
by John Keller | Jun 12, 2012 | Industry News
According to today’s MasterCard SpendingPulse report, US gasoline demand dropped to the lowest levels in five weeks.
Fuel consumption was down 3.5% year over year, the 41st consecutive drop of that measure.
by John Keller | Jun 11, 2012 | Fuel Price Management, Industry News
Today’s report from the US Energy Information Administration shows yet another fuel price drop, the ninth week in a row. The average price for unleaded regular conventional fuel across the US now stands at $3.572, four cents per gallon less than last week, and $0.14 cents per gallon less than one year ago.
The biggest drop for the week was in the West Coast, where regular unleaded fuel prices dropped $0.09 per gallon. Only the Midwest region saw a price increase, up $0.02 per gallon from last week. Regular unleaded fuel prices are down from one year ago across all regions except for the Rocky Mountain and West Coast regions.
by John Keller | Jun 6, 2012 | Fuel Price Management, Industry News
Congratulations to PriceAdvantage customer Rutter’s on the opening of their 57th store. This store has 18 auto fueling positions, four auto diesel fueling positions, and three dedicated diesel truck fueling spaces.
Rutter’s is a long-time customer of PriceAdvantage. Included in the Rutter’s fuel price management solution is the closed loop process with the Radiant POS systems and Skyline signs at each store, as well as the communication with GasBuddy OpenStore allowing Rutter’s to use mobile devices to post their most current prices on GasBuddy.
by John Keller | Jun 4, 2012 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Price Management Solutions, Fuel Price Optimization
The US Energy Information Administration reported today that US retail fuel prices dropped again, making it an eight week decline since peaking on April 9. Fuel prices for unleaded regular are now at $3.518 across the US, down from $3.575 last week, and down from $3.73 the same week last year.
Across the different regional PADDs, fuel price declines were found across the board, ranging from $.05 in the Atlantic, East Coast, and New England regions, to $.02 per gallon in the Rocky Mountain and West Coast regions.
by John Keller | May 29, 2012 | Fuel Price Management, Fuel Price Optimization
According to the US EIA, US Regular Fuel Prices fell for the 7th straight week, this time down $0.045 per gallon from last week. US Regular fuel prices are now $.12 per gallon below this time last year. The biggest drops were in the Lower Atlantic region and the Gulf Coast, where fuel prices lowered just under $.07 per gallon. The Rocky Mountain and West Coast regions were down a little over a penny.
by John Keller | May 15, 2012 | Industry News, PriceAdvantage
Partnership with Gilbarco critical to the closed loop fuel price management process
Today’s announcement of the partnership between PriceAdvantage and Gilbarco Veeder-Root is critical for those companies looking for a closed loop fuel price management system that includes the Gilbarco Passport POS.
Using PriceAdvantage at the headquarters office, the fuel manager can analyze store performance, review the latest competitor survey information, choose an optimized price for a store or market, and send out the price changes. And here is the part of the process where this partnership is so strategic – without relying on the store manager, the price changes are deployed to the POS and pump, as well as the electronic price sign, and then a confirmation message is sent back to headquarters notifying the fuel manager that the price change is complete, with a time and date stamp. The fuel manager then has a historical reference of what prices are where and at what time – there is no more second guessing or ambiguity surrounding what price is really at the street, and whether or not the store manager did what I told him to do.
PriceAdvantage is not new to the POS system environment; integrations to Radiant and Verifone are already proven in the field at numerous customer sites. PriceAdvantage customers who are customers of Gilbarco Passport, whether 100% or in a mixed POS environment, can now include the Passport POS in their closed loop fuel price management system.
by John Keller | May 9, 2012 | Fuel Price Optimization, Retail Fuel Margins
In its Q1 financial report, Susser Holdings reported retail fuel margins for the quarter were at $0.133 per gallon, down $0.02 from last year, but up $0.01 from the average Q1 results over the past five years.
Retail fuel gallons sold increased 8.8% compared to last year. Average gallons sold per store per week improved 5.8% to approximately 30,000 gallons, or approximately 133,000 gallons per month per store. That average store per gallon figure is approximately 7% above the national store average according to NACS. Q1 is typically Susser’s lowest volume quarter, due to seasonality.
Susser operates 540 stores under the Stripes brand. Susser expects to open 25-35 new dealer sites this year.
