Calgary gas prices rise due to retailers and higher demand

Calgarians appear to be getting ‘hosed’ following a dramatic increase at the pumps in the past week.

GasBuddy.com’s Dan McTeague says it all has to do with an increase in demand, higher wholesale prices and retailers bumping up their profit margins from eight to 12 cents.

“March turned out to be two months of absolute record demand for gasoline and one region of the U.S. that seems to have a shortage is the upper U.S. Midwest, same scenario as last year,” said McTeague.

In short, it’s affecting most Western Canadians from British Columbia to Manitoba where gas prices are anywhere from two to five cents a litre higher.

“What we often see is as wholesale prices go up, based on a refinery shut down (there was one in Indiana that recently shut down), that made a tight situation worse, as those wholesale prices went up – retailers decided this would be a good time to pile on the 12 cent a litre retail margins.”

“It’s an odd situation and it’s an odd way of responding to cutthroat retail margins and competition but it seems to be the way most gas stations are going.”

“It’s a perfect storm, crude is down, layoffs, prices for food are high, those in Western Canada in particular are having a real tough go of it, the prices are no longer indicative of supply and demand. They really have to do with the reflection of prices south of the border where the economy is much stronger. Unfortunately the Canadian dollar did not do us any service for the past eight months.”