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Gas prices hit Highlands
By Cynthia B. Coleman an d James Jacenich • Staff Writers
 | | Gas prices varied throughout the region this week. All the stations in Monterey were selling gas at $3.65.9 a gallon, Covington was at $3.54.9, and the low price in Staunton was around $3.44.9. (Recorder photos by James Jacenich) |
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MONTEREY and HOT SPRINGS - We all play the gas game: Drive around on that last quarter tank, looking for the station with the best price per gallon. It's a national pastime these days.
Individually, people know how the impact of the rising fuel costs feels - their wallets weighs much less. But collectively, each person, each business, each component of a business, feels the weight and burden. Living in remote mountain communities has its perks, but the steep price of traveling to work, or to shop or findentertainment has now become a disadvantage.
High prices are a norm in Europe. Gas is nearly $10 a gallon in England. But drivers in the United States are not used to higher prices and the idea of gas nearing $4 a gallon is having a profound effect on how people do business.
Terri Hevener, co-owner of Moonflowersand Morning Glories in Monterey, is feeling the pinch. "Freight fees, fuel surcharge fees, have all gone up," she says. "That forces prices up. Some things are getting too expensive - we don't mark them up and we eat the difference. We are hopeful that we will adjust to the changes. I encourage people to save on gas prices and time and shop locally."
Shipments of plants and flowers are arriving the end of this and early next week. "Everything will be here for Mother's Day," Hevener says.
Kenny Herold of H&H Cash Store in Monterey says, "We usually make one trip to Staunton a week, we get several deliveries of milk and bread. I've noticed that milk and bread prices have risen due to higher fuel costs. Surcharges on meat and produce have also gone up. I think this is temporary, higher gas prices may linger through the summer. I'm hopeful that prices will come down later in the fall."
Mark Waybright, owner of Gutshall's Exxon in Monterey, says he's noticed with each increase in fuel prices, his sales have gone down. It's not only the sale of gasoline that is affected, but his sales of tires and oil changes as well. "It takes around seven gallons of oil to produce one tire," he says. When the price of oil goes up, so does the price of tires.
"Oil companies and the weak value of the dollar is driving a lot of the fuel price," says Waybright. "Here we see it more so than most businesses. Our tire sales are way off, oil changes are off, gasoline sales are off - it seems people are afraid to spend the dollar."
He explained that the price of gasoline is set by stock market futures. "It's supposed to be the gas prices a month from today," he says. "The (price at the pump) will go up and down a few cents of whatever it does on the commodity exchange."
Waybright, like other gas station owners, buys his gas from a distributor. The distributor adds freight costs to ship the product to Highland. The gas in Highland and Bath comes mostly from Roanoke. "It costs more to ship gas to Highland than it does to Staunton," says Waybright. "We try to sell gas at a competitive rate and get enough out of the gas to pay for next load." To gain a better understanding of how gas prices are affected by the market, go to www. bloomberg.com/markets/commodities/cfutures.html and watch the gasoline futures. Whatever the price the futures are, add 36 cents for state tax and 40 cents for shipping per gallon, plus a little for the gas station and you come close to what you see at the pump, says Waybright. "For the last month, every load cost more than the load before," Waybright says.
 | | Contractor Blane Ruckman said the price of gas wouldn't stop him from doing the things he needs to do, though it makes it more expensive. The price at this gas station increased 10 cents over the next few days. (Recorder photo by James Jacenich) |
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The stock market closes at 5 p.m. Waybright keeps an eye on the price, especially on the day before he buys gas, just so he knows how much he can expect to pay when he orders a shipment. Not that he has much choice how much he pays - he's at the mercy of the market, he says. Waybright adds pennies on the gallon to that making his profit margin, after costs, very slim.
Even with higher gas prices, there's ample reason to buy locally, says Waybright. "We will go out and service anybody that requests it, says Waybright.
Wendy Van Curen of AAA in Richmond says, "There's no good news for the motoring public - a weak dollar, high crude oil prices - we anticipate gas prices will go up as much as 25 cents between now and Memorial Day." After that, the summer driving season increases demand and prices might go up a little more.
"Across the country, people are seeing $4 gas prices, but in Va. we are not expecting that much," says Van Curen. The trends are for travelers to stay closer to home, eat at less expensive restaurants and stay at less expensive motels and hotels to offset the fuel costs, says Van Curen.
AAA offers a free fuel cost calculator to help travelers budget their travel fuel costs. The calculator is at www. fuelcostcalculator.com. Van Curen also recommends drivers make sure their vehicles are properly maintained, check tire pressure, and watch the speed limit. She says the faster one drives the more one burns. She also recommends drivers ease into acceleration and ease into deceleration for better gas mileage.
According to some Millboro residents, due to the cost of fuel, the Staunton " Daily News Leader" is pulling out of Millboro, with no more home deliveries or store drops for the newspaper. County supervisors in Bath and Highland are also struggling to fixboth the school and county budgets, not knowing if gas prices will continue to climb or if they will drop after the presidential election. Three categories in Bath's school budget, for example, were increased - transportation, maintenance and food service, as these three are dependent on travel and fuel. In one of the supervisors' work sessions, it was estimated the county budget might rise 20 percent because of categories dependent on gasoline.
Mountain Laurel Creations in Mitchelltown is a new business in Bath County which has quickly grown. The shop is half a floral business and half gift shop, with the gifts wares termed as "hard items." The business is co-owned by Debi Lowry and Gloria Lindsay. During their first six months, Lowry and Lindsay did not charge for delivering orders, "as a perk for our local customers," Lowry said. But several months ago, they had to add a delivery fee. "The rise in gas prices," Lindsay said, "hurts us coming and going." Before gas prices shot up, their store bought 60 percent of its stock from California, but now, the owners buy more from vendors on the East Coast. "Shipping from California kills us," Lowry said, noting the extra charges had become too expensive.
The shop buys floral products from many sources, most located also on the East Coast, though they have one vendor from Ecuador. They buy directly from this seller who picks the flowers from his or surrounding farms and ships them directly to the shop. The flowers arrive two days after they are ordered, with no shipping fees attached.
While the rise in gas prices has impacted their business, Lindsay and Lowry say they will continue to offer floral arrangements and gifts for all occasions for their customers. "We make available a local service that provides the customer a fuel savings from traveling out of the area to make purchases," Lowry said.
Mountain Laurel Creations is not the only vendor uncomfortable passing along higher gas prices through delivery fees and surcharges.
Bath County Supply's Tom Tamanini said, "We hate it (charging a fuel surcharge). We are flatout not making any money. We are just supplying the contractors, giving good service to our customers." In order to restock their most of their supplies, Tamanini said they have to order a full tractor trailer for most companies to "come up the mountain" to deliver an order. There are some companies who will filla partial order as they deliver on a circuit route.
Even the Virginia Department of Transportation feels the pinch, though "maintenance work has not been curtailed," said district manager Mike Henry. Employees have been encouraged to conserve fuel by reducing their vehicles' idling time. "You would not believe how much fuel that alone saves," said Henry.
VDOT also encourages employees to car or truck pool to work and to reduce the number of vehicles needed during a maintenance job. As of April 29, VDOT was paying $3.05 a gallon for regular and $3.49 for on-road diesel.
As of Tuesday, Home Oil and Gas Co.'s gallon rate was $3.59 for regular; $3.74 for super; off-road diesel, 3.82; kerosene, $3.94; and heating oil, $3.82.
Wednesday morning, fuel at Fast Break was regular, $3.54; "Silver" or super, $3.64; and "Ultimate" or premium, $3.74.
Gas is a bit cheaper on the east side of Warm Springs Mountain at Oak Ridge Station. On Tuesday, regular was $3.52; premium, $3.72; diesel, $4.14; and off-road diesel, $3.63. Yet, even with gas a few pennies cheaper per gallon, traffic has stayed at a normal level, as people are not driving out of their way to save so little.
According to Oak Ridge's owner, Lynn Ellen Black, there is only a 3- to 4- cent mark-up on her fuel. "I hate gas," she said. Because she cannot make money selling gas, she uses it to draw in customers who will "buy a soda or a bag of chips and see what the store is like. I can make more money on drinks and cigarettes. I sell gas because … oh … just because."
One reason why Black cannot make a profit off fuel is credit card swipe fees. Credit card companies charge not only their customers a fee to use the card, but sellers "pay about fiveto six percent" to the card companies on each purchase.
Every time a person swipes their debit or credit card, the company who installs the payment machine receives a fee. At Oak Ridge it is 29 cents per swipe. "If someone has a problem with their card," said Black, "and they have to re-swipe it several times, I have to pay 29 cents for each swipe. Sometimes, I lose money on a sale."
Because of swipe fees and credit card percentages, most gas stations would prefer customers to pay with cash or checks.
While the high gas prices are impacting people's cash flowand changing their habits, for some the situation is not so negative.
At Valley Supermarket, manager Jeff Woodzell said currently they do not to pay any surcharges unless they go below a minimum order amount. "We have to order so much," he said, "or we pay more."
However, because of the high prices of gas, the grocery store is seeing more local traffic and catering to that traffic.
"While this gas situation is terrible," said storeowner Christie Ford, "we (Valley Supermarket) make it a positive for our customers."
Ford has been appreciative of the community support since she and her husband Jeff reopened the store. Because the community has supported the market, the market in turn wants to support the community.
Prices at Valley Supermarket are a bit higher than at grocery stores in larger communities, but the Fords and Woodzell believe money is saved by not having to travel out of the county to grocery shop. "We cannot compete with all the prices," said Woodzell, "but in the last two months we've had many comments from customers saying it is not worth it to go to Covington (to shop). There is no savings involved."
And, the store is "listening to the customer," said Ford, by filling customer requests. "People have asked for organic greens and we now have organic greens," she said. "I encourage everyone to come in and make requests; tell me what you don't have and we'll finda way to get it."
Another way the supermarket is extending support to the community is updating their old coolers with new ones for meats, chicken and dairy. "Those coolers should be in by next week," Woodzell said. Ford is excited about a new service the store plans to offer in the next month. "We are close to launching delivery (service)," she said, "to help not only with gas prices but with our shut-ins, senior citizens and folks who cannot drive. We're within 35 to 40 days in getting that started. While we can't control these darned gas prices, we can help to provide … we're really working to make it the best we can make it (for our customers)."
The exact delivery radius has not yet been determined though Ford thought the system would work by delivering to certain areas on particular days. Woodzell pointed out that "the more we sell, the more variety we can offer."
Bath and Highland, both dependent on tourism, will certainly feel the pinch as drivers elect to keep their vehicles in driveways this summer. Many, though, will go ahead and take their trips, but hopefully, they'll elect to visit here closer to home.
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