Operating a running petrol station

MH85

Can someone give me ideas about operating a running fuel station with small retail shop. I am planning to buy that shop which unbranded at the moment and a family run business. It’s in a local area in county side. Will it be wise to get the franchise of topaz or applegree and also for retail shop with central or costcutter.
I read an article from Bandara about opening a new petrol station which was very helpful. If I can some sort of those details information for an existing petrol station and what could be better to make it more functional n profitable. Many thanks

Victor

Margins on fuel are reputed to be exceptionally low, so you need to make your money on the shop. what is the planning permission and fire safety certification like. Is it likely to be affected by Brexit?

Talk to Musgraves (Centra, SuperValu, Daybreak, DayToday) and BWG (Spar, Mace, Londis, XL) and independent wholesalers in the area. Franchises are slightly different up north. Mace seem to have a tie-up with Maxol.

You have to ask why they are selling - are they making money?

Atlantic Dawn

I think you need a franchise, too much history of dodgy fuels going around in the past, lots of people will not use fuel stations that are not branded.

The margins on fuel are tiny, it's basically only used to get people in to the shop, you will make more profit on a newspaper than the fill of a car with fuel.

Targetting the breakfast, lunch, on the go food market would be where the money is.

Eric Cartman

As already pointed out , the margins on fuel are low. Its not going to pay the bills but is an essential service, make sure theres a pump for MGO (Green diesel) if its in a farming area, definitely franchise but make sure whatever provider you go with doesn't restrict what you sell.

In a rural petrol station you can often become the central hub for a lot of peoples supplies, so adapt your range for certain things and you'll make more money that way, as suggested above , newspapers and deli counters make money.

Beyond that my suggestion would be stock :

sell stamps and try get a post box put on site.
Lightbulbs, screws, rope, cable ties, some other basic hardware consumables
Solid fuels and tanks of gas.

If space allows then a jet wash is handy, far more versatile than a brush car wash and an easy money maker.

If its an area with particularly crap internet availability and mobile signal then I've seen success with adding a 2 kiosk internet station and a printer, ongoing costs are very little (you'd probably need internet anyway for the shop) and you'd get a lot of lads coming in to use it for 15 minutes and print off a 10 page document.

joeguevara

Fuel, lotto, cigarettes and newspapers are the things people purchase in petrol stations. You can add coffee but I will come back to that later. These have ridiculously low margins and are used as an enticement to get people in. Coffee is a high margin product where you can make decent money and couple that with a good breakfast roll, chicken fillet and pastries is where money is made.

Also ancillaries are where the profit is such as car wash, valet, oil, briquettes coal and logs. Things that people need when traveling can also make money such as mobile chargers, plugs, screenwash, toiletries etc.

Location is key as people rarely travel to a petrol station and use what’s on route. I agree that franchise is important but I don’t look out for a K station versus an apple green. I use what’s close and convenient and maybe if I know that I can get a bite to eat might swing it.

Petrol stations require a lot of hard work, ingenuity and entrepreneurship. Wouldn’t be my first choice as a business. Very few people make decent money. Why the interest?