Fight Back! Buy the Cheapest Gas You Can Find

As I drive around town these days, I catch myself glancing up at the signboard of every gas station I pass by silently logging the new price that is higher today than it was yesterday. Today when I saw a car swoop into the Sunoco station where regular was selling at $4.23, I was stunned. On a main road lined with competitors selling gas at up to 10 cents per gallon cheaper, this person deliberately chose to spend more per gallon at Sunoco. In a nation where branding is everything, we still believe the hype, in this day and age, that a certain brand of gasoline is better than another. Why? because these major brands spend millions in advertising dollars telling us so. And, to pay for all of this advertising, they charge more for their gas because they know we are always willing to pay more for the “premium” brand.

I know people will argue this point until they turn blue but the fact of the matter is gas is gas. Now, I know I can get testy about the taste of different brands of milk – my husband says it is all in my mind - but when it comes to gas, it is going in the car and I’m going to use it up driving from point A to point B a lot faster than I wish these days.

For more proof to the point, the following excerpts are from a 2008 issue of Car and Driver, AAA’s magazine:

“In recent years, the Federal Trade Commission has slapped several big-name oil companies with complaints about misleading or unsubstantiated ads. “Exxon gasoline keeps your engine cleaner…so it can help drive down maintenance costs,” said one ad. “Amoco Ultimate is the only premium refined an extra step to remove harmful impurities…for unsurpassed performance and a cleaner environment,” said another. The government forced the companies to pull these and similar ads because they didn’t have the scientific evidence to back them up.”

“In fact, experts point out that all base gasolines are pretty much the same. Trucks from several companies usually fill up at the same terminals, and the various proprietary additives are “splash-blended” in the truck. So there are differences between various brands, say the experts, but they don’t matter much in engine performance; as a general rule of thumb, the cheapest is the best.”

I know that those loyalty gas cards are a big incentive for people to stick to a certain brand especially when they get 5% cash back or whatever the latest gimmick. Since these cards generally carry a 21% interest rate only those of you who actually pay off the balance each month can realize a savings of $1 to $2 every time you fill up. Those of you who carry-over balances or get less than 5% cash back end up paying much more.

In any event, we cannot as consumers begin to fight the high price of gasoline if we still continue to patronize higher priced stations. If we all were to start buying gas only at the cheap stations in our area, this would create pressure on the higher priced stations to lower their prices to attract customers. We only hear about Exxon-Mobil’s record profits but Sunoco, Amoco and all the other brand names are reaping record profits as well. Nothing works overnight but we should at least try to take some matters into our own hands.