Citgo Gas sales

[JayC]

Perhaps the boycotts work? I saw this on the latest issue of Light & Medium Trucks online magazine:

Citgo to Stop Selling Gas in 10 States

Venezuela-owned Citgo Petroleum Corp. in March will stop distributing gasoline in Ohio and nine other states as part of a move to shed a lackluster segment of its business, The Associated Press reported.

While it may create some logistical headaches for about 1,800 independent gasoline retailers in the short term, the move should not have any impact on the nation's overall fuel supply, AP said.

Citgo, owned by Venezuela's state oil company, currently has to buy 130,000 barrels a day from third parties to meet its service contracts at 13,100 Citgo-branded stations across the U.S. This is less profitable than selling gasoline directly from its refineries, AP said.

Instead, the Houston-based company has decided to sell to retailers only the 750,000 barrels a day that it produces at three U.S. refineries in Lake Charles, La., Corpus Christi, Texas, and Lemont, Ill., AP said.

Besides Ohio, the states where Citgo will stop selling gasoline are Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota. A limited number of stations in Illinois, Texas, Arkansas and Indiana also will be affected. L&MT

[JayC]

Perhaps the boycotts work? I saw this on the latest issue of Light & Medium Trucks online magazine:

Citgo to Stop Selling Gas in 10 States

Venezuela-owned Citgo Petroleum Corp. in March will stop distributing gasoline in Ohio and nine other states as part of a move to shed a lackluster segment of its business, The Associated Press reported.

While it may create some logistical headaches for about 1,800 independent gasoline retailers in the short term, the move should not have any impact on the nation's overall fuel supply, AP said.

Citgo, owned by Venezuela's state oil company, currently has to buy 130,000 barrels a day from third parties to meet its service contracts at 13,100 Citgo-branded stations across the U.S. This is less profitable than selling gasoline directly from its refineries, AP said.

Instead, the Houston-based company has decided to sell to retailers only the 750,000 barrels a day that it produces at three U.S. refineries in Lake Charles, La., Corpus Christi, Texas, and Lemont, Ill., AP said.

Besides Ohio, the states where Citgo will stop selling gasoline are Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota. A limited number of stations in Illinois, Texas, Arkansas and Indiana also will be affected. L&MT

[RustyJC]

As a matter of principle, with Citgo being a subsidiary of PdVSA, the Venezuelan state-owned oil company, I don't trade at Citgo stations since any profits would go to fund the Chavez administration's agenda.

Rusty

[DonavonP]

Thanks for posting the article Jay. To me, it sounds like a good business decision based on their not being able to purchase product competitively. They appear to be all independents. Couple the skinny margins these independents work on and all the socially retarded moron "drive offs" - we'll have fewer stations to choose from.

[Tom N]

Citgo stopping to distribute gas in Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota will not help the consumer. It'll have a negative effect because there will be less competition in these states.

[chasfm11]

Perhaps you are right, Tom and there will be some negative effect on the consumers in that area. Overall, however, our voting with our pocketbooks is the only way that we can effect change. In this case, there are still several other distributing networks serving those states so Citgo pulling out hasn't created anything close to a monolpy, something that we all should fear.

I cannot believe that Citgo's move and the potential reasons for it will go un-noticed in the board rooms of the other oil companies. That, I believe, is a good thing.

[Tom N]

I'll make on more comment.

A boycott of a couple of brands of gasoline won't result in lower overall prices. Prices at all the non-boycotted outlets would rise due to the temporarily limited supply and increased demand, making the original prices look cheap by comparison. The shunned outlets could then make a killing by offering gasoline at its "normal" (i.e., pre-boycott) price or by selling off their output to the non-boycotted companies, who will need the extra supply to meet demand. The only person who really gets hurt in this proposed scheme is the service station operator, who has almost no control over the price of gasoline.

The only practical way of reducing gasoline prices is through the straightforward means of buying less gasoline, not through a simple and
painless scheme of just shifting where we buy it. The inconvenience of driving less is a hardship too many people apparently aren't willing to endure, however.