Tom Deering Posted January 16, 2002 Share Posted January 16, 2002 Fluctuating fuel prices are a way of life here. During the last four months, prices have varied (at the same stations) anywhere from $1.99/gal to $0.93/gal. They are currently trending upward in "lock step". <P> We live in a very boring climate where the weather is the same all year round and even the stock market is comparitively uneventful. Gas prices give us something to talk about. If it wasn't for fluctuating fuel prices, we'd die of boredom. <P> Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ply33 Posted January 16, 2002 Share Posted January 16, 2002 Santa Barbara would be a pretty nice place to die of boredom. <P>The only problem I know of it is that it is pretty far from skiing. Mt. Pinos is the closest snow to you, probably two or three hours away. Unless you go through Ojai and up Highway 33. Then it would be longer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 17, 2002 Share Posted January 17, 2002 Gas prices in Cheyenne are all over the place. Sinclair is one price and Total is another. Conoco isn't the same at all Conoco stations around town. Texaco is in the middle somewhere. Highway oil [an independent small station] is always a few cents cheaper than everbody else. Coastal is usually less than the higher Conocos.<P>If this is price collusion, they are doing a damned poor job of it. Maybe we just aren't as crooked out here as back East. Sounds like it is a local thing in your neck of the woods Dave, so let's not start trying to hang it on those "DIRTY CAPITALIST OIL COMPANIES" ~ hvs<BR>~ hvs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted January 17, 2002 Share Posted January 17, 2002 Since moving to Cincinnati, I've been witness to some of the most obvious anti-competative price collusion I've ever seen while buying gas for my vehicles. It is so rampant here that it seems to be almost cultural. I was wondering how serious or obvious it is in other areas.<P>To give you some idea how obvious this is here, yesterday gas prices went from $0.97-0.99 to <I>exactly</I> $1.18 inside of 2 hours at <I>every</I> gas station in town (and this is a pretty big town!). The process must be based on electronic mailings (email) because there's no way anything could be this coordinated otherwise.<BR> <BR>Locals tell me that they've put up with similar price fixings on weekends, where gas would routinely go up about $0.10 from Thursday PM until Sunday PM, but this is ridiculous. Has anyone else noted similar price patterns anywhere else? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Hal Davis (MODEL A HAL) Posted January 17, 2002 Share Posted January 17, 2002 Prices here got down to less than .95/gal and then crept back up to .99/gal. When the arabs announced they were cutting production by 6%, it went to 1.05/gal overnight. Amazing, a 6% price increase! Must be one of those supply and demand, or guns and butter things they tried to teach me in economics. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Deering Posted January 17, 2002 Author Share Posted January 17, 2002 Tod and Howard,<P> You are both very brave individuals. You have dared to use the terms Santa Barbara and Oil Industry in the same thread. The unbridled animosity each has for the other is incredible. One would think the blowout of platform Holly which happened in Jan or Feb of 1969 was current news. I've heard it said that we are living in the space age with a bicycle mentality. Can't argue with that assessment. I'd better not say anything more. I don't want to get run out of town on a rail. <P> Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted January 17, 2002 Share Posted January 17, 2002 I keep hoping to see only a 6% increase. The mass increases here are typically 15-20%, and if it takes them all of overnight to raise them it's because the weather's bad and they can't get to the sation in time. <P>Afterwards it will usually slowly trickle down to a more "normal" level, but these major, lock-step increases here are virtually a weekly occurance! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 17, 2002 Share Posted January 17, 2002 @Moon -<BR>The cartel rules! Move back to Pittsburgh. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fordee9r (Ron Springstead) Posted January 17, 2002 Share Posted January 17, 2002 I checked with some local gasoline retailers... most can't spell collusion let alone know what it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 18, 2002 Share Posted January 18, 2002 I went to Denver today to pick up some heavy stuff. Took the 454 Suburban. Had enough gas for the trip and left in a rush so I planned to fill up this PM.<P>When I got to the Conoco station this evening I found a $.03 price change had occurred during the day. IT WENT DOWN $.03 A GALLON! Those dirty colluding scoundrels just saved me $1.20. 40 gal. @ 3 cents a gal. I told you it was a 454. <P>Dave ~ Glad to see you are hooked up on your own again and not confined to the local public library ~ hvs<p>[ 01-17-2002: Message edited by: hvs ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ronbarn Posted January 18, 2002 Share Posted January 18, 2002 hvs, What was the heavy stuff in Denver - 3 dozen KKs? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 18, 2002 Share Posted January 18, 2002 Ron ~ It was supposed to be a Model A gas tank, 4 tires for the '31 chevy and 2 dozen KKs. It turned out to be 4 tires, no tank, some hood lace for Binger and the 2 doz. KKs.<P>Dan only got 8 KKs because someone ate part of HIS dozen during a stop in Ft. Collins.<P>Reminds me of the story about the little boy on his way to Sunday school. He had a nickel in each hand, one for the offering and one for candy after Sunday school. He tripped on the way and dropped one nickel which rolled down the sewer. As he got up he said, "Well, there went the Lord's nickel." <P>Same thing happened to Dan's KKs. ~ Howard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 18, 2002 Share Posted January 18, 2002 Good story, Howard.<BR>Snowing like crazy today here in Ohio, sure'd be nice to get out one of the cars, but for the salt. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted January 18, 2002 Share Posted January 18, 2002 Howard,<P>Still in the library, but getting down here more often now. I'll be online at home within the month. Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest 18DodgeBrothers Posted January 22, 2002 Share Posted January 22, 2002 Gas prices in our small city here in SE Ohio used to be within a cent of each other and always at least a nickle higher than 20 miles in any direction. Then, three months ago a Wal-Mart supercenter with gas station opened. This was just after the new gas station opened at the super K-Mart. The Wal-Mart and K-Mart are 0.2 miles apart and just south of I-70. They are usually around 95.9 to 100.9 and as low as 90.9. The Speedway, between K-Mart and I-70 will be about 6 cents higher. Then, just on the other side of the interstate, BP will be about 10 cents higher and on the northeast side of town by I-77 the BP will be anywhere from 14 to 16 cents higher. i.e., the further distance from the competition, the higher the price.<P>Les Hoffmann Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 22, 2002 Share Posted January 22, 2002 18 ~ Sounds like economics 101 to me. <BR>~ hvs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted January 23, 2002 Share Posted January 23, 2002 Guess what. Today I saw my first station make it all the back down to 97.9! Two days, maybe three, from now you can bet it will go back up in lock-step. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted February 1, 2002 Share Posted February 1, 2002 Well, it took them an entire week, but they finally managed it. Overnight (again) gas is <I>exactly</I> $1.18.9 at <I>every</I> station in the Cincinnati area. 11:00 PM last night there wasn't one station in town over $1.00.9, most between 96 and 99 cents. That's at least the 10th time I've seen a 20%+ increase in the gas price accross the entire metropolitan area in three months. <P>I ask again, is this the only area like this? Are people in other parts of the country having to wait out these periodic, collusional, anti-competative price gouges in order to avoid being taken for <I>several dollars</I> a tankfull? In the civilized parts of this country, where "conservative" and "good for business" aren't <I>necessarily</I> taken to mean the same thing, this kind of fleecing would be illegal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted February 1, 2002 Share Posted February 1, 2002 Ted, with all due respect I could coordinate gas prices accross the entire eastern seaboard from this chair with the right series of email addresses. The point is that it's all too obvious that someone here <I>is</I> doing just that, with total cooperation/participation. <P>As for the entire metro area's coordinated commitment to the scheme, I'd say the 100+ stations I drive by on a daily basis is a reasonable sample from which to interpolate.<P>p.s. I paid $8000 for my current daily driver, and it gets 30/38 mpg. I also happen to appreciate that my last loaf of bread and box of tissues were delivered by a truck driver who's passing these fuel costs on to me as well. I don't think he gets gas milage in that range. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted February 2, 2002 Share Posted February 2, 2002 @Moon -<BR>Not that I doubt your accuracy on this, but the chances that you actually observed the price at <I>every</I> service station in the <I>entire metro</I> Cincinnati area within the time frame indicated is zero. I lived in Cincinnati seven years and know that you would have to have Santa Claus like ability to be everywhere at once to pull off this observation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted February 2, 2002 Share Posted February 2, 2002 suit me just fine if gas would go to 3 bucks a gallon or what ever it takes to get about 1/2 the people off the road. (probably wouldnt take much of an increase). What good is cheap gas if i gotta stand in line or put up with traffic jams everywhere i go. I vote for EXPENSIVE gas and cheap EVERYTHING ELSE. The strangest thing i find is that people driving the MOST EXPENSIVE cars are the people that cry the loudest about gas prices. What the HEY!!!! if u can afford a $50K+ car then what difference does it make if gas is $1 or $3/gal.??????? GET REAL! <P>Only a bunch of boys would think that they can cheat Rocky out of a dime. It takes a REAL man to outsmart J.D.Rockefellar... and to this day it has NOT been done yet.<P>At 15 MPG let the Packards and Cadillacs roll with a wide open road ahead of them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted November 4, 2003 Share Posted November 4, 2003 <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> The process must be based on electronic mailings (email) because there's no way anything could be this coordinated otherwise. </div></div> The local news here tonight interviewed an independant Sunoco dealer who's gone public with his (admirably moral) refusal to continue to participate in this charade. He flatly stated for the record that the major oil companies fax all of their company owned stations the day before with instruction as to what the price will be the next day. The local independants simply jump on the bandwagon and happily match the (curiously consistent) price set by the oil companies for their outlets ASAP. The guy is 30 miles away from me, or I'd be buying gas there everyday! I was saddened to see that this practice had spread as far from here as Flint, MI this summer. Also the price jumps have grown to 30 to 35 cents per gallon (Last week it went from $1.29-$1.33 to $1.59 everywhere (again, <span style="font-style: italic">every</span> station in town at a seemingly prescribed hour). Are they doing this where you live yet? =========================================================By the way at the time of the report (6:00PM this evening) the Sunoco station was selling regular for $1.40/gal, whereas <span style="font-style: italic">today's</span> local average price was $1.53. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Hal Davis (MODEL A HAL) Posted November 4, 2003 Share Posted November 4, 2003 Dave,No they're not doing quite that here. At least not on the weekly basis you described earlier. What they do do is have some major increase like $.10/gal in one day, then maybe $.03-$.05 for another couple or three days in a row. Sometimes this will be after a big news story that might loosly be tied to potential increases in oil prices. Sometimes it seems to be for no reason at all. After they jack up the prices for a few weeks, it will GRADUALLY and I mean GRADUALLY come back down. It had gone up from say $1.22 to $1.50 in a matter of a few short days back two or three months ago. Over the past month or so it has trickled back down $.01 at a time. It is now $1.27 at the lowest priced station I know of. The other two stations at this exit have follwed suit. There is never more than $.01 difference between the three of them. The funny thing is that these three stations are $.10 cheaper than anyone else in town. I haven't figured out why that is. That is a new one. Usually everyone is about the same except the three at the airport exit which are typically $.10 higher than anyone else. Taking advantage of tourists filling up their rental cars before returning them, probably. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R W Burgess Posted November 5, 2003 Share Posted November 5, 2003 Home town Warsaw, Va.-$1.42, 10 miles across the river at new discount station-$1.32 and 2 other stations next door to him, the same price. W. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
48LCCOUPE Posted November 5, 2003 Share Posted November 5, 2003 Oil companies tied in with price fixing Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted November 5, 2003 Share Posted November 5, 2003 <div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Oil companies tied in with price fixing </div></div>Dave, you have no idea how typical that kind of complacency is around here. The Sunoco franchise owner openly expressed dismay during the reoprt that when he would raise his price with the other dealers in the area his business woudl actually <span style="font-style: italic">increase</span>! The sheep that live in this area will bend over and take virtually anything at this point. Meanwhile one state away Pennsylvania has had a (perfectly constitutional) law on the books for 50+ years that cuts this kind of behavior off at the bud. In PA it is illegal for a gas station to change it's price (up or down) twice in 24 hours. This compounds the organization needed for these kinds of schemes exponentially. But here, where everyone's so enthralled with their <span style="font-style: italic">Morning in America</span> where nothing can go wrong anymore, this goes on for years with barely a mention. The auto editor of the local paper wrote a collumn on this problem once. He's looking for work right now.As you can see from the post count on this thread, nobody cares except me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Hal Davis (MODEL A HAL) Posted November 5, 2003 Share Posted November 5, 2003 I had some business to attend to yesterday at the airport exit I mentioned before. The three major named stations on this exit (all owned by the same family of immigrants) were selling 87 octane for $1.459/gal. Right across the street at MurphyUSA (Walmart) it was $1.279! Two exits up, all three stations are $1.279 and $1.289. Gotta wonder who in their right mind would buy from the other guys. Those three stations near the airport always have the highest price in town. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Skyking Posted November 5, 2003 Share Posted November 5, 2003 Why are the southern states cheaper than the northern states???? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest SalG (Sal Grenci) Posted November 5, 2003 Share Posted November 5, 2003 New York is always more than the south, we like are taxes high on everything. Gas, real estate, sales, income. In short there never is a tax that is low. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
48LCCOUPE Posted November 5, 2003 Share Posted November 5, 2003 as it should be Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Skyking Posted November 6, 2003 Share Posted November 6, 2003 David, that's not nice....... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Hal Davis (MODEL A HAL) Posted November 6, 2003 Share Posted November 6, 2003 Because our income is so damned low! We'd have to walk if gas cost any more! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Albert Posted November 6, 2003 Share Posted November 6, 2003 Years ago the Government of Ontario (Canada Eh) did a study to determine if there was any Price fixing between companies, and as to weather there was a relationship between the weather forecast for the weekend and if it was also a long weekend, and you know what they found it was just a coincidence, Yah right.. just like the price of parking at the baseball game goes to $30 but the regular days it's only $8.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rocketraider Posted November 6, 2003 Share Posted November 6, 2003 Figure this... gas in this city is 10-12 cents higher at the pump than at the same brand stations 10-20 miles out in any direction. All stations here get their gas from the same suppliers as those in outlying areas. I don't think there's any local gasoline tax (though if there were a way they could tax it I'm sure they would- they tax everything else. Does anyone else have to pay "entertainment tax" on movie tickets and video rentals? <img src="http://www.aaca.org/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />) so that doesn't account for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted November 7, 2003 Share Posted November 7, 2003 This chart appears in the paper from time to time. It is only current through mid-2002, at which point the regular price increases were still in the 18-22 cents range. It illustrates a running average of fuel prices in the metro Cincinnati area compared to the National average. Which one looks to <span style="font-style: italic">you</span> like it might be indicative of some kind of manipulation? Bear in mind, these prices are for <span style="font-style: italic">every</span> station in town. And the next town. And the one after that. There is no driving 10 miles away to escape this. Outside of the the Sunoco station in the news report, and two Flying J truck stops 60 and 110 miles from here, I don't know of <span style="font-weight: bold">ANY</span> place that doesn't play this game within 150 miles of Cincinnati. If your prices are changing like this on a day-to-day basis, they've got you. Don't expect what we have that passes for a government to help either. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rawja Posted November 9, 2003 Share Posted November 9, 2003 .....A couple obsevations..... First of all I'd like to point out that in every instance the prices paid in Cincinnati are LOWER than the national average, which would be easy to see if the charts more appropriately showed the national and Cincinnati prices on the same chart. Secondly, a small city with, I dunno a few hundred gas stations is necessarily going to look herkey-jerkey compared to the national average with tens of thousands of gas stations. If there is a major conspiricy at work here, I would expect that the pricing of gasoline would trend higher, not lower. Let's face it, Gasoline is a commodity product, and people are extremely resistant to paying higher prices due to brand loyalty. If there are two gas stations, I don't care if it is a Mobil station or a Shell station, I'm going to the cheaper guy which necessarily means that on any given intersection, the price of gas is going to be close, if not exactly the same, and changes in pricing must be reacted to immediately if you want to keep cars comming to your pumps. Like in real estate gas prices are also tied to location; I live in Brooklyn, and work in Manhattan there is a Mobil station on median of the Belt Parkway near where I live whose prices are 20 cents higher than anywhere else near, but hey, you dont have to get off the parkway, so he manages to stay in business, prices around the edges of Brooklyn (which is ringed with a parkway/expressway) are higher than in the interior which unless you are already there is a pain in the a** to get to, and Manhattan prices are astronomical, if you can find a station at all. I have been told by friends that live in New Jersey that the pricing at the stations along the commuter corridor of Route 1/9 are higher in the direction the commuters are traveling as it is difficult to get to the "left" side of the road, so the prices go up and down depending on the time of day. So what? that is the market at work. If you are willing to lose an extra 5 minutes on your commute, you can save a nickel a gallon on gas.I'm sure we are being taken advantage of at times, like when the news reports a tanker running aground and there is an immediate jump in gasoline prices across the country, but there is also tremendous downwards pricing pressure applied by our lack of brand loyalty which self-lmits/regulates the price we pay. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave@Moon Posted November 9, 2003 Share Posted November 9, 2003 RawjaNYC,When you wake up tomorrow and the retail price of gas is exactly the same everywhere within 150 miles of you, up 32 cents/gal. from the lowest price available last night,.......And you find out that the wholesale price in your area actually declined that day,......And (after the price declines <span style="font-style: italic">most</span> of the way back due to "downward pressure") it happens again,........every 7 to 10 days for 4 years plus,......And a major retailer goes on the evening news and openly states that the price increases <span style="font-style: italic">(again--totally unrelated to wholesale prices)</span> are being dictated in written form 24 hrs. in advance from distant areas by the oil companies, directly through their retailers and indirectly through the independant dealers that are utterly dependent on the oil companies for product,...<span style="font-style: italic"><span style="font-weight: bold">...And neither the media nor the law enforcement will do a damn thing about it!</span></span> (Probably due to the political influence gained by the fuel retailing industry in your area because of an over-simplified/one party system there.)..... <span style="font-weight: bold">[color:\\"red\\"] Then you can tell us all about how normal it is! </span> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CTW Posted November 10, 2003 Share Posted November 10, 2003 Has anyone seen?http://www.theautochannel.com/F/news/2002/07/04/143230.html?NEWSLINKS TO GASOLINE PRICE DATA FOR US CITIESIt has links to cities all over the US for current price data Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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