Why a one day boycott will not lower gas prices

An effective strategy for lowering gas prices

Published on May 24, 2004 By RR0967 In Welcome

The oil companies are laughing at us, all the way to the bank. The oil companies are making record profits this year, dispite the erronious rumors of an oil shortage. You see, a one day boycott only gives the oil companies a one day vacation. You NEED to purchase fuel to get to work, deliver goods and services and so forth. On the designated day of a boycott, you will either purchase gas the day before or the day after rendering the boycott ineffective.

A more effective strategy is to target one oil company and stop purchasing fuel from that company. Let us start with, for purposes of discussion, that we target CHEVRON gas stations for the month of June. If nobody purchases fuel from the targeted stations for the entire month of June, then that oil company is left with a stockpile of product. The company still has an overhead to cover. Employees to pay, electrical bills to cover and lease payments...etc. You on the other hand, are still able to purchase fuel for your daily and weekly needs. You just simply purchase fuel from SHELL or ATLANTIC RICHFIELD or MOBILE...etc, just not CHEVRON. At least for the month of June. This will cause the other oil companies to realize that you, the combined customers have the ultimate control, the ability to chose who gets your money for goods and or services.

If at the end of June gas prices are not lowered, another oil company would be targeted, lets say SHELL for the month of July. Eventually, the oil companies may get the message and the industry would go through a pricing readjustment. I am not whinning for the days of $1.25 per gallon of gas, just more reasonable pricing. When gas prices go up, everything goes up. Milk, eggs, bread, mufflers...you get the idea.

Tell me what you think.

Rich

Comments

Melvos Love God

on May 25, 2004

Hi there,

I agree in principal with what you are saying, but on the whole of it, basically, it is not feasible. Why? Because you would not be able to get all the people in your area or country to "Walk as they talk". Some people have more disposable income so it would be easy for them, people who are not so well off, they are going to buy the cheapest Petrol/Gasoline that is around, and if the Oil Company realises what is going on, they will drop their prices accordingly to sway the population to go back to their product. Also I am sure that it would be difficult to have a campaign against an oil company even with the help of the internet.

Also I dont know if you have any dealing with the way that an oil co runs, the costs of running the risk to do what they do are high, although the income that is generated is also very high and may seem unfair. What you have to realise is that not all business dealings and conditions are the same as where maybe you come from. There is a lot of corruption and nefarious dealings going on in the major oil producing areas of the world, and this cost of all these deals have to be passed. The person who has to pay for all this in the end is the consumer YOU and I.

I could ramble on, as I dont particularly like them, but they are a neccessary evil until someone figures out a cheaper safer renewable energy sourse to poer the way we live

RR0967

on May 25, 2004

I agree that, in large, the population has the attention span and intention of a nat. I believe that all that would be needed is a 10%-20% decrease in the consumption of fuel from one oil company to effect a change. However, getting that many people to stop purchasing from one oil company would be quit the challenge. I only wanted to point out the futility of a one day boycott.
Thanks for the input
Rich

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