'Selling cheap fuel helps people keep costs down', says Shropshire garage owner

The owner of an independent garage selling a litre of petrol for about 20p cheaper than many other garages says he wants to help people keep costs down.

Dave Roberts was selling a litre of petrol for 166.9p and diesel at 185.9p at DA Roberts near Whitchurch in Shropshire on Wednesday.

He said he wanted to pass on reduced costs to customers and felt supermarkets were "reaping" profits.

Petrol costs have dropped slightly from the record highs seen earlier in July.

Prices then reached 191.53p for petrol and 199.07p for diesel.

Mr Roberts said he watched the markets daily and liked being able to react accordingly.

However, the surge in prices had led to people driving off without paying and he had almost £1,000 of fuel stolen over the last month.

"We obviously made a good deal with the oil company when we started our contract," he said.

"We are just about to change to another contract which is more local... and carry on giving our local people a good price.

"What enables us to keep that up mostly is, we sell a lot of fuel and we keep up-to-date with the daily price, so if the future price alters tomorrow, we can alter it that day after or whatever. That's what enables it to be done."

He said drivers queue until the garage closes at night and "it's not long" before the queues start again after opening at 06:00 BST.

Overall he said his margin was quite low but added he felt the supermarkets were just "reaping in on the profit".

"Here, we run how we want to run it and we take our margin out what we need and we try and help the locals, the cost of living and that jazz. It's a help towards it," he said.

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