RUSSIAN SUPPLIES

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 63, 16 March 1933, Page 12

RUSSIAN SUPPLIES

"A SERIOUS CHALLENGE'

(By Telegraph.) (Special to "The Evening Post.")

DUNEDIN, This Day. •,.

. The keen competition in the sale of motor spirit which has prevailed amongst Dunedin retailers for the past eighteen months has now been extended to oil companies, selling in bulk.

A representative of the Otago Motor Club stated that in view of the entry of the Associated Motorists' Petrol Company, Ltd., on the market as a seller of Russian petrol, the other companies had seen fit to reduce the price. This reduction, he ventured to say, did not result solply from the representations made by the Minister of Finance to the oil companies. He pointed out that the offer of a reduction of 3d a gallon in the retail prico to shareholders of the new company -was regarded as a serious challenge to the other companies.

Special consideration to the whole question of petrol prices was given at a meeting of the Motor Trade Association, and it was recognised that competition amongst retailers had been so intense during the- past eighteen months that petrol was actually being sold at a loss. In view of the fact that many service stations would go out of business if the present margin of gross profit was retained, it was decided that only half of the reduction made by the oil companies could possibly be passed on to the motoring, public. It was agreed that the universal price of petrol in Dunedin would be 2s Id for first grade and 2s for second grade.