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Yea, well if you put everything up at self-serv like everyone else, never pump gas for anyone or check their oil, never wash a windshield, and everyone else is doing the SAME THING you are all going to get the same low price.

Agreed. But is there a demand for such service? There may have been in the past, but I am not so sure. Certainly here in Europe it is non-existent, everything is self-serve.

You are fighting a trend, in that the cost of labour in western economies is rising compared to the cost of the raw material (oh, don't forget the government may c**p all over your business model at any time by changing employment laws, taxes + regs). At some point, it just becomes uneconomic to provide "service plus".

I managed gas stations for eight years. Started at a small town station in a rural part of California where we gave very full service. Relocated to Los Angeles and took a job managing a station there.

I was not that smart, just did not know any better. I had the crew give the same service in Los Angeles that I was used to providing in the small town. Very full service.

Because of corporate structure here, Union 76 had to charge about 4 to 5 cents per gallon more - they marketed it as better gasoline. So going in, I had this problem of higher prices.

Because of the service we provided, we went from being a sleepy station to a quite busy one, from 1400 gallons a day up to 2800 gallons a day on average and still had prices $0.05 above the other stations. Of course, sales of oil went up also.

With the added traffic for gas, we also got the lifts busy with tire rotations and other minor maintenance that we did not overcharge for and got done quickly. It was stuff customers needed.

The service was so good out at the pumps, my attendents were getting tips - unheard of at a service station. We paid 50 cents per hour over what other stations paid there help and we got really good work from our crew.

It was really fun. I believe the formula would work even better today as there is so little service out there now. I think you see some of this coming back in stations that have, we pump for old ladies on tuesday and similar such "special" service offerings at gas stations.