OKLAHOMA CITY -- How low can it go? At an OnCue Express in Oklahoma City, the price for gasoline fell to $1.99, triggering a flurry of news stories and social media buzz, along with a price war among area gas stations.
The OnCue Express was opened only a month ago by OnCue Marketing LLC, Stillwater, Okla., which has more than 40 sites in the state. It lowered its price for regular gas on Dec. 3 by 12 cents per gallon (CPG) to reach $1.99 per gallon. As reported by the GasBuddy.com blog, it had been more than four years since a fueling site in the United States was selling regular gas at that price.
Traffic soon began backing up around the OnCue Express on the south side of the city, according to a Bloomberg report. A nearby station, 44 Food Mart, quickly lowered its price to $1.98 per gallon, which others followed. The lowest price that day was found in the nearby suburb of Moore, Okla., where Broadway Food Mart had changed its price to $1.95 per gallon.
Jim Griffith, OnCue Marketing CEO, told Bloomberg that the store’s lowered price was not in reaction to falling crude prices but rather was “to give something back to our customers” before Christmas.
“Obviously, we’re not making any money at this price,” said Griffith. “We would prefer it to be in this range though. It puts money in people’s pockets and they buy more things at our stores.”
According to GasBuddy, 15% of gas stations in the United States are currently selling gas under $2.50 per gallon. In a blog post, analyst Patrick DeHaan said that prices may soon fall to $1.99 per gallon in parts of Texas, South Carolina and Missouri; already some metropolitan areas were less than 20 CPG from the magic number.
While it is not likely that any city or state will average out at under $2 per gallon, DeHaan said that the national average may fall into the $2.50 per gallon range by Christmas. According to figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), the national average for gasoline on December 1 was $2.778 per gallon, down more than 4 CPG from a week ago, and more than 49 CPG lower compared to a year ago.
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