Price Expectation

Most of the 37 stations in the Cheap Gas Catalog have featured the rock-bottom price in Sacramento at some time in the last 9 years.

I collected information and snapped photos of these stations on March 17, 2003. On that day, the lowest price I found was $2.05/gallon, in three locations. The price expectation number is the number of cents a station was on that about that day. For instance, Station #025 has a price expectation of +6, which means that its price was $2.11 the day I was there.

Gas prices change often, and the low-priced station has changed at least five times in the last two weeks, so the price expectation numbers are pretty pointless, but they are something to build on.

I believe that independent stations tend to change their prices when they get a new shipment of gasoline, and they tend to keep that price until they sell it all. If the wholesale price is falling, that would tend to mean that stations with recent deliveries would have the lowest price.

This page last updated April 16th, 2003 | Copyright © 2003 Rob Cockerham