How are families and entrepreneurs dealing with continuing high gasoline prices?
Some are taking advantage of loyalty programs offered by the grocery chains who see discounted gas as a loss leader for boosting their grocery business.
When Central Ohio supermarkets began launching loyalty programs several years ago, Michelle Moore signed up for all of them.
The programs, such as Kroger’s Plus Card and Giant Eagle’s Advantage Card, give discounts to shoppers on many of the groceries they buy. But the Upper Arlington woman and a vice president at public relations agency Paul Werth Associates said she spends $400 to $500 a month to feed her family of four and the discounts she typically received weren’t great enough to engender her loyalty.
That changed when the grocers began selling gasoline. Now Moore regularly shops Giant Eagle stores because for every $50 she spends, she gets a 10-cents-a-gallon discount at Giant Eagle fuel pumps.
“I save (the discounts) up until they accumulate,” she said. “My personal best is $1.40 off per gallon of gas. I was ecstatic.”
With pump prices closing in on $3 a gallon, many Central Ohioans are looking to their grocer to gas up, and the supermarkets are eager to please.
The grocery industry is a mature one. Gasoline sales can boost store sales by 5% which - according to insiders - is “huge in this industry.”
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