

A dime may not seem like a lot, but it's a world of difference for travellers who only live less than 75 kilometres apart.



Recently, Fort St. John and Dawson Creek have seen a wide discrepancy between their gas prices.



In Fort St. John, the prevailing price of gas was about 138.9 on Wednesday. Meanwhile, in Dawson Creek, several stations were holding onto prices as low as 126.9 per litre.



This is quite a change from the past few months. Three months ago, on Dec. 17, 2013, the price was actually cheaper in Fort St. John than Dawson Creek. For Jan. 17 and Feb. 17, the prices were the same.



But starting around March 1, prices diverged sharply.



When asked about the prices, Cordell Schmidt, who works in the Fort St. John area, could only say "Wow."



"That seems strange to me, that's for sure," he said. "I would think that driving 30 or 40 minutes down the road would add that much to delivery costs. It seems like someone's making more money somewhere."



Jason Toews, who co-founded GasBuddy.com, a site that shows user-reported gas prices at various stations around North America, also said that the 73 kilometres between the two cities shouldn't make that much of a difference for gas prices.



"There might even be a cent per litre increase in the gasoline, because the trucks have to drive further to get to Fort St. John. It doesn't make 12 cents of difference," he said.



It's still unclear why some stations in Fort St. John are charging so much more. But even the relative stability of prices from city to city and station to station are surprisingly ... not, these days.



For example, on Wednesday afternoon, Safeway's gas station was charging 133.9 in Fort St. John and 126.9 in Dawson Creek. For Shell, both stations are charging 138.9 and 138.9. For Esso, it's 138.9 on the north side of the Peace, 134.9 on the south side.



Calls to Safeway representatives asking for comment were not returned as of press time.



Leanne Dohy, a spokeswoman for Imperial Oil, the company that owns Esso, commented that the formula behind gasoline pricing was complex. However, she said she could not say why these particular gas stations' prices were so divergent.



Michelle Slade, of Shell Canada, said she could not get someone from her company to talk about the difference. She pointed to portions of the Shell website instead, which said that local retail forces affect prices, as retailers compete for customers.



"The amount of fuel a station can sell may also affect price," the website states. "A Shell station that sells more fuel and other products may be able to offer customers a lower price than a station that sells less fuel."



However, in Shell's website, they point to examples like Toronto gas station owners needing a smaller margin to sell gas because they're in a bigger city than a station in Regina.



In addition, Toews said that prices have and will continue to depend mostly on "what the market will bear ... and if they have to be competitive or not." In many cities, but less commonly in Northeast B.C., gas stations can lower their price in the expectation that they will sell more gas and make more profit.



"(Centrally run gas stations are) balancing: 'Well, we can lower our price, but we need to sell more gas to make up for that lost profit.'" said Toews. "So they're constantly weighing this, saying 'If we lower this, will we get more business?' If the answer is no, then why lower the price?"



In other cases, they may decide to alter their prices in an attempt to get more people into a convenience or grocery store to spend more money in there.



"Using Safeway as an example, maybe they don't care about making profit off gas, because they're just trying to get people to sign up for their club card, and spend a couple hundred dollars on groceries, so they don't see as much of a need off profit of gasoline," said Toews. "It may be very well that Safeway is just not making any money off gas in Dawson Creek, but they want to build a little bit of a profit margin in Fort St. John."



Other factors in this pricing are the shift over of seasons. Cold-weather gas additives are generally cheaper than hot-weather additives, and there can be a spike in prices while this occurs, according to Toews.



Another analyst also pointed out that gasoline itself can vary slightly from place to place, which could affect prices. Michael Irvin of the Kent Group, which analyses petroleum prices, said that "often times you'll get price differences based on the fact that - especially when there's only a few players in town - lower-priced inventory have not been depleted yet before the higher price comes in.



"There are all kinds of examples where bigger cities which have very rapid inventory turnovers, usually in the course of 24 to 48 hours, prices will go up. And then smaller surrounding communities, where there are gas stations who receive supply only once a week or once every two weeks, they're happy with their markup ... until they get the higher-priced gasoline, and overnight they have to raise their price," Irvin added.



"It would not surprise me in the least that that would be the reason you're seeing it, but if it were sustained over a month, I'd be surprised."



In the future, consumers in both cities can expect to see higher prices as winter turns into spring.



"We usually see gasoline prices increase in the spring and early summer period right across North America," said Irvin. "On the other hand come fall when demand declines that's when we see pump prices actually fall."



Either way, it could change the consumer habits of people like Schmidt.



"Now that I know (the price differences), if I was in Dawson Creek and I was heading this way (to Fort St. John), I would definitely fill up before I got here."



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