May
23
Written by:
RSouthard
5/23/2008 6:00 AM
With gas prices approaching $4.00 per gallon (and that’s economy fuel) it may be time to figure out how to save pennies that you might not have focused on historically in order to continue working with your legacy fuel suppliers. Are you aware of other sources of supply? Is it possible to save a few pennies per gallon by making your suppliers compete for your business?
When the price of oil goes up, and today crude futures retreated slightly after topping 135 U.S. dollars a barrel for the first time; we hear mostly about the price of our gas at the pump. In the U.S. we don’t expect to pay this much for that precious commodity we all need in order to get to work, drive the kids to all of their activities, buy groceries, go to the doctor, and when time permits enjoy our leisure activities. What we don’t hear a lot about is the price of all the related fuel products like diesel, kerosene or jet fuel. The truth is they are all going up.
In our SafeSourceIt™ North American supplier database there are 3,292 U.S. suppliers in the major category fuel. This data can be further filtered into sub categories such as kerosene, diesel etc. Data can then filtered by region, zip code and a variety of other classifications. The same data is available for Canada and Mexico.
With the availability of this type of data, retailers may be able to reduce or hold their fuel prices. In most cases fuel either directly or indirectly represents one of many retailers top spend categories. Watching rack rates daily and having new sources of supply that are also trying to survive compete for your business provides a formula for saving pennies and takes the emotion out of the decision making process. In the food industry where net profit regularly runs at 1% or less pennies add up.
I know I’d go to a pump that was priced at $3.99 per gallon instead of one next to it priced at $4.00.
I look forward to your comments
Ron
Copyright ©2008 Ron Southard
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Re: Retailers are your fuel purchases pennies wise? Some fuel for thought.
With gas prices remaining at extra-high levels – and predicted to go higher through the summer – These price increases are also impacting real estate agents and all the other professionals tied to the industry. I know there's a lot you can do electronically, but real estate jobs seem to be more mileage-dependent than a lot of others. I have considered adding a surcharge to make up for the extra gas charges. However, do you think that this would impact my overall success? I realize that majority of all of our time is spent in cars, it's getting expensive, but that's something I could imagine passing on to clients as it is another cost of owning a business
Some recognize that a high inventory of homes listed, rising gas prices, reduced home prices, low interest rates, and a mortgage "transformation" that threatens to make it nearly impossible to get a loan in the future, all mean a good time to buy.
I've educated my sellers to realize that their homes, while not worth today what they were 2 years ago, have still appreciated immensely since they bought the home. If you buy at $230k, "could have sold" 2 years ago for $540k, and sell today for $480k, you haven't lost $60k, you've made $250k. It's not a hard concept to grasp, but many sellers aren't seeing that. I educate mine, they do see it
Steve Carnevale
Re/Max Results Plus- Cincinnati, Ohio
513-777-SOLD
www.ListingorBuying.com
By Steve on
5/24/2008 11:39 AM
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