Costco to sell Petrol @99cl in Brisbane Sydney ?????

[hess]

I know the distributor i work for turned over $113 million last year. So if he isnt getting 10% theres an issue. Think i need to be in his shoes

[flappist]

Originally Posted by The Monty

Are you telling me they only made 200k profit on petrol for the year, and not one person bought a drink or a choccie bar? Come on Mr. Flap, you know better than that.

It is true though, the overheads must be massive (I say must, as I would have no idea, except what I can imply). It isnt a lot of profit per year considering, but I think that with combined sales of things, the profits would be quite handsome.

The whole thing was a hypothetical model to demonstrate some of the costs involved in running a business.

One simple observation. If petrol stations are such gold mines why are there so many in receivership, administration or just closed.......

An Mitch, each of those "on the runs" are a collection of separate businesses, not just one.

[data_mine]

Originally Posted by MercurySilver

yeah the dockets are not my thing either
and usually ive left it in the kitchen

stick 60 bucks in and get $2.40 off

i tell the old girl they arent worth it and she says:
"would you throw that 2 odd bucks in the gutter??"

yeah yeah i get the point

Guarantee you you're being ripped off more than that $2.40 at the supermarket.

Coles/Woollies are not giving away discounts here, they're just moving the money around, so it looks like it to the uninformed.

Then there's the "spend $5 in store and get an extra 4c off" in the servo store full of high margin overpriced impulse buys. It's win/win for the supermarkets (you buy more, one to get over the $30/$50 coupon threshold, and again at the servo store, and it's usually going to be high margin goods), and lose/lose for the consumer (lack of competition = high prices).

Having said that, you'd be silly not to use the coupons, otherwise you're being gouged both at the pump (who doesn't think the pump prices are 4c more than they need to be) and at the supermarket.

consumers = screwed in this duopoly.

[XBROO]

I save that much shopping at ALDI, I don't car what servo I use( Mostly BP). Yeah they can have their rewards card with their over priced groceries. Don't know much about this costco mob but 99cl certainly got my attention.

[LTDHO]

Sorry if I missed it, but who's fuel will they be selling?

Oh and shop-a-dockets are a great idea. At least once a week I will spend over $30 and woolies (it's the local shop for me) and I fuel the daily once a week at woolies. So why not save 4cpl?

[Bucknaked]

Originally Posted by XBROO

I save that much shopping at ALDI, I don't car what servo I use( Mostly BP). Yeah they can have their rewards card with their over priced groceries. Don't know much about this costco mob but 99cl certainly got my attention.

We tried Aldi many years ago, but found their stock is so limited, that we ended up back at Woolies to get everything we can't get at Aldi. I agree though, their prices are much better. Shame their range is limited.

[The Monty]

Have you tried ALDI lately? There range has improved immeasurably. Id say you could buy 95% of your shopping list there now, not just the basics.

[jpd80]

And if people changed the way they drive, they could probably save more than the value of a shop a docket too..

[Stefan]

Originally Posted by flappist

Hmm yep...all that goes in your pocket....

Well except for:

Now lets see $27k every 2 or 3 days lets make that $70k a week or $3.5 million a year.

Not bad money.

Oh hang on, probably need a servo to sell it from.
$20k-40k per week lease lets sat $30k, so there is $1.5M gone.
Or could but it freehold at $20M for a cheap one which is 1.6M/yr interest only. A servo that sell $150,000 l per 2-3 days is not a corner store in a small country town.

Now who is going to sell the stuff. Hmm at least 3 staff plus a manager that is $5k a week including super, workers comp and other oncosts, so $250,000.
Oh it is 24hr so 6 shifts as no one works more than 38 hours and penalty rates for weekends, nights and holiday so there is another $1.5M gone.

Down to $500k and we have not taken into account licensing, rates, electricity (this is not a house with cheap power and rates), spillage of both fuel and food, theft, insurance, accountancy, legal.......

Starting to run out of money a bit here.

But lets say the nett profit after it all is $200k or about what a mine worker gets. Well at least you don't have to go into the desert.

But then what happens during bad weather. No one goes out but the costs are the same.
Power outage? No income then.
Road works? Sometimes many months of almost not customers.
New freeway bypassing the site, bank doesn't care.
Petrol shortage, hard to sell what you do not have.

And of course as it is your business and if it goes wrong your house that is lost and life destroyed you are thinking about it 24 house as day 7 days a week, no holidays, no breaks.

There is a reason why most businesses go broke in the first year or so and it is because the average person who just goes to work and takes home a pay packet with all the tax prepaid, gets 4 weeks of paid holiday, super, sickies and workers comp has no idea whatsover of what is involved in running a business. All the see is the gross amount.

What? It's not all profit?

I thought it was all profit.

Lucky we have you to guide us, I would have never thought you had to pay a lease, wages, insurance, tax, blah, blah, blah, blah...

And guess what, there is the mechanic that is in your building (or you are the mechanic), I sell drinks, chips, ice cream, lollies, news paper, pornos, bread, milk.....

And if you are real smart you manage to build equity in the business and maybe make a nice chunk when you sell the business. I can't sell my $200K per year minejob for a million bucks after five years... nor can I really get 5 mine jobs and just pay a Pakistani student to go mining on my behalf.

Oh and I see sooo many service stations going broke around here so margins must be real tight.

[XBROO]

Originally Posted by Bucknaked

We tried Aldi many years ago, but found their stock is so limited, that we ended up back at Woolies to get everything we can't get at Aldi. I agree though, their prices are much better. Shame their range is limited.

Yeah mate same tried Aldi few years ago and didn't like it. Tried them again at the start of the year and yeah much better. All I can suggest is try their brand and if you don't like it top up from woollies. The only things I don't get from Aldi is toilet paper, but mostly the missus wants her brand. Me I don't care what I wipe my bum with.

But seriously I save about 50 to 100 dollars a week shopping at Aldi. I have two little ones so I shop every week, also what puts people off is the check out. But you just have to organise your trolley, so you can put all the heavy stuff up first then you can just pile away.

[XBROO]

I don't know much about running a business or a servo for that matter, but there's a little BP that has been in my area for donkey years. And I have seen the owners have kids and now they have grown up and are working there. I was talking to his young fella the other day, and he was talking about his 800hp supra. But I said I thought the new BMW was yours. Yeah that's my work car and the daughter drives a new looking sport Merc. The father and mother always have prestige cars. Both the kids own there own houses and they haven't hit 20 yet.

So they aren't doing to bad, they are always good with price of fuel and keep their tanks clean as the fuel is always good quality. In store they are the cheapest in town with Jac iced coffee even beats woolies for price, as well as alot of other product they have. Maybe they are doing something the other servos aren't, but they are definitly not struggling.

[Stefan]

My job is to hire subbies / business owners everyday, just like Flap they cry poor, tell me all about their expenses and how tough it is. I drive my 5 year old base model territory and they rock up in a brand spanking Euro cars.

One civil contractor I've dealt with for a 18 months, has in that time manage a new top of the line Pajero for his wife, a new 5 series for himself, then the wife got an upgrade to a brand new Range Rover as the Pajero did not cut it.

I get the "it's tough: sing song every time he is in the office, my reply is always, I wish it was that tough for me..

Or the formworker I was using 7 years ago, who dressed like a slob had the worst truck on the site and always whinged about having no money. But then his worker laughed and told me he owned the biggest house in Hunter's Hill (Sydney) only with about $7.5 Mill. I did see it a few years later and had to laugh to myself.

Don't get me wrong, I admire them and they do take the risk for the reward and sometime lose plenty, but it gets tiring hearing how I have it better just because I get 4 weeks off per year and get some super (if my employer decides to actually pay it, rather than using it to fund his Italian sports car)

[Franco Cozzo]

To be honest I'd rather be making minimum wage flipping burgers at Maccas, then go home and forget about work when I walk out the door. On weekends procrastinate about cutting the grass and watch TV all day instead, maybe go to the movies or catch up with mates.

People with their own successful business never escape work, they stress about work all the time.

They have money but not time to enjoy it, when you die (earlier) you can't take it with you.

Lets face it, the more money you have the more money you spend on useless crap, I was saving more money at Honda, on $7 an hour then I am now on $15.72.

I spend most of it on cars, then squander the rest

[Full Noise]

Originally Posted by pottery beige

i heard woolies and coles 95 has mothballs in it to raise octane..

That’s not true, toluene and ethanol are used to raise the octane number. In the case of 95, it’s only toluene.

Originally Posted by MercurySilver

woolworths are a complete pain in the ***

100% agree.

Originally Posted by MercurySilver

coles are a bit more relaxed

Just as bad, if not worse.

Without going into a great detail, I will say that I’m a tanker driver and have been in the industry for many years. It was never going to be a good thing when Coles and Woolworth’s got into the fuel game.

I’m my opinion, the person who thought up the whole shopper docket system is without a doubt, an absolute marketing genius.

The loyalty shown to retailers because of these shopper dockets borders on insanity.

Example: People will use these dockets and not even look at the price of fuel. THAT IS A FACT.

There are many sites that I deliver to that must be closed when a tanker is on site due to site access and exclusion zones. There are many people who will wait in their cars, some for nearly an hour just so they can use their shopper docket.

The funny thing is that with the sites that don’t have the LED price boards, the knucklehead in the shop has to come out with a big pole that has a suction cup attached to it to change the price, and guess when a convenient time to do that is? Yep, when the tanker’s there.

So while mister tightarze is waiting for the tanker to finish so he can save 4c a litre, the price has just gone up 16 cents a litre. Wow, what a saving and he only waited and hour to pay more.

There are many examples where there are multiple servos on a stretch of road and people will come in and fill up and not even look at the price of fuel at the servo next door, even if it is 16 cents cheaper. I used to point this out to people but not any more. If the sheeple are stupid enough to blindly follow Coles’ and Woolworth’s BS propaganda, then more fool them.

[Stefan]

People do strange things at servos.

A fair few years back I recall a 10c discount (from 80c to 70c) at the local BP and the line of cars snaked around the block, people waiting for an hour, nearly getting in punch ups.

The saving in your average sedan was maybe 6 bucks. The way people were acting you'd think they were giving it away.

So I can just imagine the stupidity of people that Full Noise is describing.

If Costco sell for 99c, people will be driving 200Kms just to fuel up, probably bring jerry cans Mad Max style.

[data_mine]

yeah I don't get it. for even 8cpl, that's like $5, save yourself that much by not getting a coffee for one day.