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Historical Note
This historic article appeared in The Bulletin in April 1966 some 60 years ago when the oil company marketing departments were trying to change the conception of refuelling and demonstrates the concerns and the fact they had to convince the regulators that this was safe to do so.
Jamie Thompson
Chair APEA Technical Committee
The next few years will see motorists applying the do-it -yourself technique when calling at filling stations for petrol and oil. Self-service at the filling stations is beginning to emerge as a sophisticated, attractive development which can offer many advantages to the motorist.
BP is in the forefront with three important experiments. The most fascinating of these is the note-acceptor –machine which pockets the motorist’s £1 note and dispenses £1 ‘s worth of petrol. It is a flexible machine, too, If the motorist does not want that much fuel the machine will give ten shillings worth and four half-crowns in change. A receipt is always included.
The BP Retail Market Division of Shell-Mex and BP plans to introduce this unique machine for petrol retailing to the United Kingdom m 1966 and a company site in Watford has been ear marked for the experiment. It will be the. first of its kind ever carried out in this country. A similar machine is in operation in Sweden but apart from that they are none known anywhere in the world for use in petrol retailing.
Already, before the site for the experiment has been built, the BP note-acceptor machine has caught the public imagination as a forward-looking move to keep abreast of the increasing pressure of demand from a large number of motorists.
BP self-service experiments began in the United Kingdom in March, 1965. The marketers had been appraising for some time pointers which indicated a growing public interest in self-service as a straight service and not simply as a reduced or second-class method of attending to customers.
Remarks made to dealers by customers, remarks made by dealers, letters from motorists about self-service they had experienced abroad and, of course, the statistics relating to peak-hour filling station traffic of the future produced an interesting picture for those whose business life is the promotion of service for motorists.
The experience gained by BP marketing companies in other countries in self-service fitted like a well-cut dove-tail into the attitude which was now discerned in the United Kingdom market.
In Western Germany, BP has 2,000 pumps on coinoperated sites which are unattended at night. During the day the pumps are operated conventionally. These have become extremely popular with long distance as well as neighbourhood motorists. The service works easily and is a business getter, particularly at night when, but for the automatically-operated, self-service pumps, it would not be economic to keep stations open.
In Stockholm, a capital whose high standard of living is renowned, fifty per cent of filling stations are now self-service.
The result of this perception of a new market, on the one hand, and the availability of marketing experience, on the other, led to one of the most interesting experiments in marketing carried out by Shell-Mex and BP.
At Knighton, Buckhurst Hill, Essex, the BP self-service experimental station was opened in March last year. This is an experiment on the principle of post-payment self-service, whereas the note-acceptor experiment planned for 1966 will be pre-payment self-service.
The Knighton station is a spacious, well-designed site where the pumps are under cover and alongside a self-service shop supplying many types of accessories which are placed on super-market-type shelves. Signs invite the passing motorist to drive in and serve himself and then pay a woman cashier for his purchases at the kiosk which is part of the shop.
The pumps beside which the motorist parks his car are standard Wayne pumps. The motorist takes the hose, inserts it into his car’s tank and delivers as many gallons as he wishes. While the petrol flows the gallons and also the price is shown in the normal way on the pump head.
A repeater device in the kiosk tells the cashier how much petrol the motorist is taking and what the price is. So, when the motorist comes to the kiosk window his bill is waiting for him.
Should the motorist need oil he helps himself to a tin on the forecourt and pours its contents into his car’s sump. During the coming year this form of motor oil self-service is to be improved.
In future the motorist wishing to buy motor oil will be invited to push a button and ring up the cashier on an inter-corn which is built into the pump. He will say Visco-Static on the broadcast. The attendant will then press a switch which will release from a stand a can containing the right amount of oil of his choice.
Self-service car washing at 2 shillings a do-it-yourself Vacumobile for the interior of the car at 6d. and a self-service paraffin dispenser which delivers in two-shilling amounts are also available at Knighton.
And if the motorist wants a hot drink or a snack or confectionery there is a vending bank beside which he may park his car while making his purchase. Prices range from one shilling to two shillings for confectionery and snacks. Cigarette machines are also installed.
This self-service site is open from 7 a.m. until 11 p.m. seven days a week and one of a staff of three is on duty all the time. They are alert to provide service to the motorist, although the emphasis remains on self-service and the effect of self-service.
How are these effects assessed ?
In a number of ways, because the marketers want every useful scrap of information they can get about how self-service goes. They know that this method of dealing with customers is still in its early days and that there is much to learn.
They assess the volume of business, of course, and compare it with the flow of business at similar sites of a conventional kind elsewhere in the country. They also like to know exactly what the customer thinks about the self-service station.
At certain intervals motorists calling at Knighton are interviewed on the forecourt by research experts who find their job made pleasant as well as easy by the fact that the motorists appear to enjoy taking part in this exercise.
Questions such as: “Why have you come here?” “Do you mind serving yourself?” “Why do you like-or not like-serving yourself?” “Are the instructions easy to understand?” “Would you come again ? “ are put to the motorists.
The sale of every type of merchandise at the station is watched, as well as the use made of the forecourt area, the placing of signs and their effect and the access of the shop to the customer.
A great deal has been learned in the few months since the site went into business. Now plans are in hand to develop a second site of the Knighton kind in Northern England during 1966.
Knighton station is in a residential neighbourhood. The one in Northern England will be in a more industrial area. Useful comparisons will be possible.
At Elmbridge, near Bognor, a BP dealer, Mr. J. T. Cate, is carrying out an experiment using the Wayne coin operated self-service pump.
Last spring an ordinary type of pump which had one particular difference was installed. It was fitted with a machine which would convert the pump into an automatic one by the simple process of turning a small key.
During the day Mr. Cate’s attendants serve the passing trade from this pump in the conventional way. But at night, at the time when the station used to close, Mr. Cate turns the key and the pump then becomes available for automatic self-service by any motorist.
He obtained permission from Chichester Rural District Council to leave his station unattended during this self-service period of the night.
Motorists see that the filling station’s lights are still on and if they want petrol they drive in and read the instructions on the automatic pump. They are asked to put in two half-crowns at a time in order to serve themselves with five shillings worth of petrol. Many do this.
Mr. Cate has done a reasonable business with this device since he installed it as an experiment. All the business is new business but without the coin-operated pump he would not have been able to justify emergency service of this kind.
His experience high-lights one field in which self-service will probably spread rapidly. Each year the roads take more and more traffic at night, a development which 1s particularly noticeable during holiday periods.
Night traffic is encouraged by the road organisations and, in holiday times, also by the police. The percentage of filling stations which remain open at night to serve this traffic is, however, comparatively low.
There is not enough business, and in many areas, there is the added difficulty of finding the extra staff to man the station even to test the night business.
Clearly the coin-operated and the note-acceptor machines could help to provide an emergency service where none would otherwise be possible.
Another field for their development is undoubtedly that of the peak hour filling station traffic, when, despite all hands being to the pumps, the dealer cannot cope with the traffic as fast as he wishes and as a result loses trade. The use of an automatic pump, which could also be operated at night, would, in these periods, probably be a considerable asset.
Will a note-acceptor machine be more popular than the coinoperated pump ?
The arguments are easy to imagine. The motorist is more likely to have a £1 note than a pocket full of half crowns. But is it not likely that the note acceptor would be suitable for one type of trade in one particular area, whereas the coin-operated machine would be more suitable in another district, possibly even an adjoining district ?
It is only through experiments that the answers to such questions can be found.
The BP note-acceptor site which it is hoped to operate at Watford in 1966 will be watched with interest by all in the oil industry and motor trade. No doubt the customer himself will find participation in the experiment an interesting matter.
Driving into the forecourt he will see six pumps on two circular, covered islands. One will have three one-pound pumps and the other will have three ten-shilling pumps.
He will decide which island pump he prefers, put his car beside it and go to the note-acceptor machine. It is housed in a small cabinet and has a short push button key board.
The motorist has to push a button selecting the pump he wants. He will, for example, choose the button for one pound’s worth of BP Super Plus, or that for BP Super or the third for BP Regular. Similarly, he can order ten shillings worth.
He next puts his one-pound note into an open drawer which he pushes forward on a slot into the machine. The change appears in a metal cup just below his hand, together with the receipt.
Collecting these, the motorist walks across to his car and fills the tank, the note-acceptor machine having directed the right volume of fuel to his particular pump.
The coin-operated pump, the post-payment type of self-service and the note-acceptor machine are all tangible developments in better service for the motorist in the future.
