Comment on the April 21 prediction: Prices rose exactly as predicted. CORRECT.
Sunday, May 4, 2014, 9:30PM: The ethanol pricing problem is history (for now), and prices have been dropping the past week, except for some screwy jumps in Ohio. We are getting to the point where retail prices are about the same as what the retailers are paying, which means a price hike is on the horizon, perhaps as soon as Monday. Back to $3.79? –EA
I would think higher since around my area of Northwestern lower MI the price is $3.689.
Weird in Ohio indeed. The UDF that sold out of gas Friday evening, was stocked full sometime before 9am Saturday(that’s when I drove by), selling for 3.799(matching the Rich/Speedway across the street).
Throwing out the 2 stations that are ALWAYS highest in sw Ohio(currently 3.99 and 4.09), we have prices that range from 3.44 all the way to 3.89. Traveling a couple of blocks(out of sight of any Speedways, that is) can save you 30 cents/gallon.
No spike in Indy yet, and we’re well within the normal late-morning spike window. We’re 7.2 cents below the national average, something we haven’t seen for months.
Speedway’s attempt at a spike in sw Ohio late last week, seems to have failed miserably. Average Cincinnati price is 3.62. Topped off for 3.489 this morning.
Gas $3.44-$3.69 in South Bend, IN. I filled up for $3.47.
WOW!!! Fort Wayne is now 15 whole cents below the national average. Figuring that we pay over 20 cents per gallon sales tax that 39 other states do not pay, this is a whopping savings. FILLER UP PEOPLE!
Reporting Greedway just west of Kalamazoo is 3.79, looks like it has begun…
TimmP, I knew it won’t last here in Grand Rapids.
Speedway is resetting us to $3.79
$3.799 in Indy too.
Spike underway to $3.79 here in South Bend, IN. I hit $3.47 yesterday. Can still get it as low as $3.43.
Passed by several stations in Elkhart now showing $3.79
The first station, a Shell, has gone to $3.79. My tank is good, but I sure would like to get out of work in time to top off the tank at what is now a very low pricing.
WOW! $3.33 at the lowest stations, and we are all headed to $3.79. That is a 46 cent hike. Just a few cents shy of the all time record of a spike of 50 cents.
Ohio has joined in the party. We’re jumping to 3.799 as well.
I’m still at 3.59
Part of an article on WOOD TV8’s website – a link for the article is below. IMHO, I think this is why people are balking at raising the gas tax for roads – because we already pay a high tax.
The House Tax Policy Committee on Wednesday voted to permanently allocate money in Michigan’s general fund to roads and bridges. Michigan’s taxes on gasoline are among the country’s highest while its per-capita road spending is among the lowest because much of the sales tax on fuel goes to non-transportation funding.
Legislators want to dedicate more of it to roads without hurting funding for education and local governments.
http://woodtv.com/2014/05/07/house-panel-oks-redirecting-370m-to-roads/
Just a observation. Back in the 70’s, and 80’s, in this area, Bonded and Checker started the spiking thing back then. Speedway may be driving it now and introducing more locales to it. What I see here in Fort Wayne, is that other chains have picked up on the “rules” if you will, and they actually change their price first, as though BEGGING Speedway to do their thing. There is a Shell station on Illinois road near i69 that was the absolute first station reported on Gas Buddy, followed by the entire LASSUS chain, then CLARK in some areas, then finally Speedway. It has been going on like this for almost 18 months now. They evidently have learned well, and beat the master to the spikes.
Aren’t/weren’t Bonded and Speedway “sister” companies? We had Bonded around here in sw Ohio. They eventually all became Speedways, with the same color scheme.
http://www.freep.com/article/20140507/NEWS06/305070124/road-funding-michigan
Gas is $3.79 in Troy now too. Interesting article in line with what Sam posted. Channel 7 news posed the question, “is Michigan moving towards having toll roads?” According to the article that won’t be the case. – Another bill that would allow MDOT to enter into public-private partnerships for road projects had been portrayed as a way to turn some Michigan roads into toll roads, but Schmidt said that was a mischaracterization. “This does not automatically put toll roads in place,” he said. “That is not the case and this bill doesn’t allow for that.”
A few Elkhart stations decided $3.69 was their new price. Should help drive the others down fairly quick.
I thought Bonded was owned by Valvoline/Ashland at one point. They ended up being part of GREEDway.
From Wiki:
…As self-service gasoline became legalized in many states, Marathon decided to use “Speedway” (without the “79”) at higher-volume self-service stations with convenience stores. The concept turned out to be one of the few bright spots for Marathon during this time, and quickly expanded this concept across Marathon’s main territories across the Midwest and Southeastern United States. Part of this expansion was through the acquisition of various other smaller regional gasoline station chains, including GasAmerica,Starvin’ Marvin, Gastown, Wake Up, Bonded, United, Cheker, Port, Ecol, and Value. These stations were converted to the Speedway branding…….
Gas in our local town went from $3.37 yesterday to $3.79 today ! Glad I filled up everything I had (at the lower price). The gas guys really don’t want to give us any breaks !
Oil stubbornly is staying at $100. Guess the longs have not made enough profit yet !
Pilot, Flying J and Gas America are owned by Marathon as well.
Jak- That’s not true actually. Gas America was bought by Speedway, which IS yes a subsidiary of Marathon.
Pilot Flying J is solo now, Marathon sold off their stake years ago.
Gas dropped to 3.65 from 3.79 at the Kroger station in Troy. By using my Kroger Plus card I saved .80 cents a gallon so actually only had to pay 2.85 a gallon. My husband bought two 5 gallon gas cans and fills them up when he fills up our SUV. Using a Kroger Plus card is great if you grocery shop at Kroger’s. From now thru July you get double fuel points on Friday, Saturday & Sunday. You can get 1000 points by only spending $500 for groceries and that saves you $1.00 off each gallon of gas up to 35 gallons. If you’re interested you can find out more about Kroger fuel points here…https://www.kroger.com/fuelfaqs
Spike has failed along my commute. Of the 13 stations, only one is still as spike price(guess what brand…). The rest are back to their pre-spike price, most lower.
I rarely shop at Kroger despite having a store a mile away. Their prices are remarkably higher than our combination of Meijer + Costco. The rewards save $35 per $500 spent but one has to evaluate what they’re getting in order to get the rewards.
Turbo46032: If you’re a sales shopper Kroger can be less expensive than Meijer. On many items I find Costco actually costs more than Kroger or Meijer. Each individual would have to weigh it out to decide if it would be worth it for them. It sure works great for me.
Admiral back down to $3.42 in South Bend, most in $3.70s still. Many @ $3.42 just across the line in Niles, MI.
The biggest benefit to getting gas at Kroger is when Kroger has the 4X points when buying gift cards. We load up a bit on the restaurant gift cards when they have this. At 4X the Kroger points mount up quickly.
I guess it all depends on where you live. Some Krogers are like sheep and follow the GREEDway spike immediately. Some of our Krogers wait to see how the spike shakes out before making a decision. Our Kroger in the Woodlawn section of town pushes back against the GREEDway down the street. The last couple times that GREEDway had to reduce their price to be competitive as a result.
Where I live, between Costco being a little distance from me and Sams charging a higher membership fee I am still on the fence with picking up a membership.
The Fort Wayne area has stayed stubbornly high. Most stations still $3.74. I visited Wauseon, Ohio Saturday. Wauseon was a haven of 20 to 30 cents below any NW Ohio community. Filled up at a Shell, no points anything, $3.43. The whole town was.
Looks like GREEDway is resetting the price back up to $3.79 in Ohio. Aparently thay can’t stand the margins under 90 cents any more.
Same in Michigan!! Thank you Sam’s Club – $3.46
Price hike in Chicagoland today was unexpected in that Speedway’s margins were nowhere near as low as they usually are just before a price hike. The post hike margin is about as always.
So, we’ve gone from (in Ohio) 60 cent spreads being the trigger, to 70, then 80 about 3 months ago. Now we’re at 90. Their last 2 spikes have failed around here. Guess they’re hoping the 3rd time’s the charm. I’ll make sure I top off at my favorite UDF for 3.559 on my way home tonight.
Anderson & Muncie IN cranking up to $3.89. Got lucky and just topped off at a Pay Less for $3.52. WTI Crude is up, up, up….will Chicago Spot follow?
Speedway spikes 1st to $3.89 here in South Bend, IN today.
Most stations in the area were in the $3.60s, but a dozen or so were $3.39-$3.45, not for long….
Can somebody explain where they’re seeing evidence of such high margins? The prices paid by consumers are easy to find, but what about the cost for the sellers?
I’m not saying anybody is incorrect — it just doesn’t seem to match what’s posted on this site.
Are you guys using RBOB for that margin calculation? Because that’s never been the only consideration in calculating a gas price.
I am using Chicago spot/CBOB. As of this morning, the spread between CBOB and Cincy retail was 87 cents.
3.69(avg retail in Cincy this morning)-2.8146 = 87.54 cents
And, I DID top off for 3.539 on the way home tonight.
As of 5:30 the only stations along my commute that spiked were 2 Speedways. Everyone else was the same as this morning or lower.
Ren…
Not seeing any higher margins at their hike price (after). Been 85-90 cents over RFG wholesale for quite a while. It’s just that today, here, pre-hiker margins were still about 10 cents better than they had been letting things erode to before hiking for years. Flattening the lower part of Speedway price cycle.
Price just jumped from $3.65 to $3.89 in Troy, Michigan too. Shaking my head!
Avg Cincinnati price stands at $3.706. Yesterday avg as the spike was initiated was right around $3.692. Relatively speaking that is not much movement. Many parts of town at this point remain unaffected by the spike. I’m crossing my fingers and hoping for spike rejection in a more grander scale than the last two spike failures.
Still no takers on the spike along my commute. Could GREEDway be losing their influence? One can only hope.
Plenty of takers along my commute (central Indiana). You’re seeing latent spikes. Oftentimes one area spikes first then starts to drop and about 24-48 hrs later the spike spreads widely but the early spikers are now dropping…
Not that I would wish harm on anyone, but the president of GREEDway is * showing his face * on TV commercials for their support of Children’s Miracle Network, or some such.
Gotta wonder if he receives any credible threats because of the pricing practices.
GREEDway is donating a portion of SpeedyFreeze sales to them. Nothing like promoting the intake of HFCS-laden beverages.
/rant