Shortages Affecting Service Stations
April 16, 1979
SIGN OF THE TIMES at a Main Street service station which ran out of gas to sell to consumers a week ago. Several other Susanville stations “ran out of gas” over the weekend, but received supplies this morning to resume sales.
Local retailers and wholesalers blame increased traffic through the area for the rising demand for gasoline. Fuel supplies have actually been cut to wholesalers due to the lack of west coast refineries, explained a supplier.
The reduced supplies to wholesalers means less gas for the local station and less for the consumer, he explained.
News Report: Gasoline Shortage in Susanville
Many Susanville gas stations have been forced to reduce operating hours, close on Sundays or impose quotas on the amount of gasoline available to individual customers over the past weekend in order to stretch out their reduced allocations of gasoline in the face of rising demand for fuel by motorists.
At least four stations have sold out of gas over the weekend while waiting for their next shipment from wholesalers. The wait for new supplies varied from a few hours to more than a week in one case. These forced shutdowns created an increased volume for stations which remained opened.
Station managers agreed that the current shortage is not nearly as tight as the 1973 gas “crisis” when some Susanville stations shut down completely on weekends and reduced operating hours on weekdays.
The deciding factor in the shortage is insufficient supplies of gasoline from wholesalers to cover increasing volume of retail sales. Local stations are selling gas faster than ever but have less to sell than last year.
One local wholesaler estimates that Reno-bound traffic through Lassen County on U.S. 395 has increased 25 percent over the same period as last year. Yet he is forced by his oil company to cut allocations to the 11 retailers he serves in Lassen, Modoc and Sierra counties by 15 percent of the supply he delivered to them one year ago.
To keep pace with the increased demand, he explains his company “should” give an 8 percent increase to retailers but is forced to cut back due to a shortage of gas available from his oil company.
In addition to the shortages, the pump price for regular grade gas at self-serve “gas only” stations in Susanville has risen an average 10.3 cents per gallon since January 1 according to a survey of three Main Street locations.
Self-serve regular fuel at such stations normally represents the cheapest local gas available to motorists. If the increase were to continue for 12 months, it would amount to an annual inflation rate of 40 percent for the stations in the survey.
The average price per gallon of regular fuel at those stations has risen 8.3 cents in the past 30 days and 6.3 cents in the past 15 days.
In spite of the rising prices, consumer demand is higher than ever according to retailers. In neighboring Plumas County, however, retailers reported yesterday that gas supplies were not as “short” as in Lassen County.
Retailers and distributors agreed that the closure of Hwy. 70 from Quincy to Oroville contributed, in part, to a surplus of gas last month for some stations. As a result of this road closure, consumer demand fell and many retailers in Quincy were able to stay within their allocations without being forced to close on Sunday or take other measures.
Lassen County wholesalers were less fortunate. All four of the major wholesalers contacted this morning indicated that they were forced to cut back on retailers’ allotments by 5 to 15 percent.
Union 76, Shell, Texaco and one independent “jobber” were questioned and all insisted that their allotments and price increases were dictated, in turn, by “the major oil companies.”
