Missing the bigger picture
In a thin and trite article on behalf of BBC Autos, Erin Biba asks whether, despite the current oil boom and increase in car ownership in the UK and US, we're witnessing the end of petrol stations.
From 2002 to 2012 the number of fueling stations in America went from 170,018 to 156,065. So, what's going on? How is it possible that demand for fuel can be so high, when places built exclusively for accessing it are disappearing?
Erin Biba, The end of the filling station?, BBC Autos
According to Biba, the answers to these questions fall into three major categories:
- Limited availability and high cost of land, particularly in cities;
- Petrol isn't a filling station's primary source of revenue; and
- Aggressive price competition from megastores.
I cannot help but think that she has overlooked one significant factor, and possibly the most significant at that: consolidation within the oil industry.
All of the abovementioned causes may play a role, but when oil giants merge, the closure of redundant stations—closely situated stations that were once competitors, but are no longer—is not far behind. I worked for BP during a time when it merged with both Amoco and Veba; in both cases, BP stations in the US and Germany closed in favour of brand-dominant Amoco and Aral stations respectively.
I would have posted this to BBC Autos directly, but they only communicate through Facebook or Twitter, and I don't do that social networking thing.