> Even the handles on the gas pumps get buffed down regularly so that “the customer does not put his hand on something dirty,” he says
This is what most UX designers do for a living. They think about the small details which get overlooked while everyone is in a rush to build out x feature/functionality.
It's what creates emotional connections to products and services which builds strong customer loyalty and helps word of mouth.
Just like how they used to know your name at your local small grocery store, those intimate details go a long way. And in commoditized situations people are willing to spend more time/money or go out of their way to use your product.
Dan Norman talks a lot about this in his "Emotional Design" book. It's the design stuff that goes beyond merely functionality and most efficient problem solving (ie, obsessing about fewest clicks to do x, instead of the wider experience where adding a communication step might improve the emotional experience).
But often it is a luxury for many smaller firms struggling to just get the functionality part right, which is why this person buying up gas stations, providing time and capital, and giving them the attention they needed is working so well.
This guy is putting customers first, which is the exact opposite of most UX design philosophies I've been on the receiving end of. The entire discipline prioritizes minimalism, copying Apple, and making random changes to the interface just so they have "accomplished" something, which is how you get randomly broken messes like Youtube.
If UX designers made a gas pump, it would be a featureless white pillar with a single button and a hose and it wouldn't work.
I agree this kind of thinking is good, but disagree that it should be concentrated in a role with a title like UX Designer.
Ultimately, we make things that serve other people. All of us need to pay attention to how our work impacts the users we serve. Experts can help with that, but the Lone Design Ranger isn't nearly as powerful as a cross-functional, user-focused team.
I would also suggest that at least in tech, smaller firms aren't the problem here. As you say yourself, the small, neighborhood grocery store can get this stuff right just by paying attention. I think the big problems come at scale, where managerialism and over-focused metrics can easily disempower people and get them focused on the wrong thing.
>Just like how they used to know your name at your local small grocery store, those intimate details go a long way. And in commoditized situations people are willing to spend more time/money or go out of their way to use your product.
Additionally - it also shows how there are things that you never expect that have a positive impact. Suggests to me that there are so many factors that affect people's product choices, and that many of the factors that drive a certain choice are not fully understood by either the buyer or the seller.
I really don't buy any of the UX spiel that you laid out. I guess it depends on what kind of product you're buying, but I have never personally had a personal connection to any (technology) product. The only UX I care about is the application being responsive and doing what it says it's going to do. Additionally, I have never once recommended a product because it has evoked an emotional response for me.
To be clear, I am not saying that UX as whole is not needed, but I do not need someone who has made a career of it to elucidate me on the finer points of emotionally connecting with a user via tooltips and the like.
Quick Trip is a national gas chain that does all of these little things right. Always clean. Good bathrooms. Pumps always work and are clean. Checkout is always fast even when the store is really busy. Excellent product selection for a convenience store. Bright and welcoming. That is how I characterize them. This engineer is helping other stations have that same polished feeling.
> Just like how they used to know your name at your local small grocery store,
When I was in college, there was a small restaurant nearby, Burger Continental. The owner knew us students, and when ordering he'd always upgrade our orders for free, usually with a big flourish. We knew why he was doing it, but we still enjoyed him doing it and patronized his establishment a lot.
There are definitely lessons for software makers. Slack had this. Great custom emoji support. Just enough Markdown support. Many other little things that just work. Their recent “rich editor” changes are universally reviled at my company. Even our non technical staff hate it. It took them like 5 minutes to learn old way and they used it fine. This would be analogous to something like adding a feature to gas pumps that slows everyone down or leaves you feeling vaguely annoyed because you made me go through too many screens at the pump.
>And in commoditized situations people are willing to spend more time/money or go out of their way to use your product.
It depends if your customer has money to spare and/or if they value the improvements. Walmart succeeded precisely because people don't care about anything other than price for commodities.
Funny though, it may not be the pumps. That just might be an expression of their strict cleanliness. It maybe some other aspect that actually brings in customers. Or possibly the sum totality of 'clean' and not any one thing.
Assuming it's not product or price, it's interesting to note how a professional appearance makes the difference.
This only applies if you are not the only company providing the particular service your customers need and you don't provide any key extra features that no other service provides. I've worked on some apps (through an agency) with really poor UX but 50k monthly active users because they provide a niche thing people need so the people are willing to put time into working out the interface.
Scaling a location based workforce that the owner is visiting once a month and maintaining quality standards is hugely impressive.
As the article explains the owner is drawing his HR from the Egyptian immigrant community.
As such I think the “secret” of success in this tale is the unique funnel he has developed to find motivated, highly responsible, and respectful labor.
Which is almost impossible to find in the US at this point with employment reaching all time highs.
Good lesson for anybody that thinks the “buy and improve” strategy is going to come from giving a near minimum wage worker a playbook and checking in once a month.
1) If you want to see an example of that in the Bay Area, the Mile 8 convenience store/gas station at 19th Ave. and Irving is pretty amazing - great selection, two clean, inside restrooms. Closes at 8 pm though. Cheapest sandwiches, snacks and coffee in the area.
2) The article has a good explanation of how an immigrant community works together to dominate a niche using a favorable banking tie and a labor stream. A similar story is that most Bay Area motels are operated by Gujaratis (fixed), and in Canada minimarts by Koreans. Both have strong banking ties for pre-approved loans based on sufficient family labor and the community track record.
3) The Albanian resistance movement in the last Serbian war was funded by a small construction firm in New York. The owner fed back enough weapons and snipers to ground the UN helicopters (!) persecuting them, as well as lobby in DC. There's a very impressive video online.
Here's a thought: if the percentage of cars on the road which are electric rises significantly over the next decade or so, will the corner gas-station have a problem? I have heard that the gas is not really the source of profits, but it is the source of the traffic. If fewer drivers need to fill up (or they have to do it less often, in the case of a hybrid), will the convenience store business model be threatened? Or, perhaps, it will just more or less seamlessly morph into the corner grocery store.
If things remain the same, business will likely flourish: such station can install charging equipment as well, and since recharging takes more time than refilling gas tank, customers will spend more time (and money) on site.
EV drivers will need to spend much longer filling up, particularly at high-demand times when there's a queue. Gas stations will probably transition from grab-and-go to a more café style atmosphere where people don't mind spending an hour.
The end of the article talks about this specifically. Basically if half the gas stations close down, you just have to be in the top 50% to stay in business, and because of less of competition they can even increase margins.
You would have slightly fewer drivers as people would charge at home. However, that's probably a low percentage of the total.
For those that stick around, the duration of a visit will generally increase (filling up 200 miles worth of petrol takes less time than 200 miles charge, even at 100kW or more).
I'm more likely to buy something at somewhere I perceive to be 'overpriced' if I'm there for longer, want somewhere nice to sit and eat, etc.
Countries with fewer cars driving fewer miles still manage to have gas stations, so I think basic market economics will kick in. Gas will get more expensive, or stations will get a little more sparse, or both. After all there will still be a demand.
Most gas stations seem offensive and predatory in the items they offer customers. I understand freedom of choice and business models but the entire system is plagued by unhealthy and potentially dangerous products (eg random herbal supplements, synthetic cannabinoids etc). And more than half of gas stations in major cities don’t have bathrooms (people abuse them obviously). And the workers are often underpaid.
Verse a system that offers fair pricing, healthy options, positive re-enforcement, incentivizes public facing employees to learn CPR and first aid, paying higher wages to help upward mobility and savings, creating a place for community interaction.
Nope, it’s just sugar, cigarettes, “rhino” pills, alcohol, mistreated underpaid employees living a fraction of their potential, dirtiness and no bathrooms.
Your assumption that they should try to promote things paternalistically is the really weird assumption from my perspective. Positive reinforcement sounds like the sort of thing which would creep out customers and employees like a company policy that all transactions are closed by hugs.
In whole those requests aren't a cohesive strategy, or even a collection of separate ones "competing" for balance but a wish list. Paying higher wages to ensure quality of workers for lessened expenses or better effective throughput is a strategy. Just paying higher wages isn't a strategy, it is an out of context goal for a business model. At best it would be an alternate profit distribution which would make it and be peripheral to what makes an enterprise work.
Starting with the end in mind is a good concept but a viable path to get there is needed or else it will end in failure and tears.
On another note fair prices aren't a real thing economically. Despite efforts from medieval times to failed Communist attempts at solving a valuation problem. Fair is a judgement which may be anywhere from well informed to utterly insane.
The actual secret is low cost of capital and low labor costs, probably both in violation of various labor / tax / finance laws and regulations. This supposedly gave him free cash flow to invest in capital improvements.
"in 1998, he scraped together the $75,000 down payment, much of it from family and others in the local Egyptian community"
"One key factor: Said staffed his new location with fellow immigrants from his church, Saint Mary Coptic Orthodox Church in Lynnwood"
"with the help of a broker — another member of the local Egyptian community — Said got a loan and closed the deal"
"Mainly, Said checks in with his managers and staff, many of whom are Egyptian immigrants looking for their own start in America. Many are referred to Said through his church or the local Egyptian American community; some hear of Said even before they leave Egypt."
The magic here is he leaned on his community to everyone's benefit. This is a thing immigrants easily do in America and it's a massive competitive advantage.
It works even for non-business. Immigrants will lend each other money for mortgage down payments, cars, exercising options, investments, cover expenses until long term cap gains, etc. in amounts most Americans would balk at. Easy six figure sums with no real collateral. If the investment pays off or whatever, the person loaning doesn't get a percentage or anything like that. All they get is what they already have: continued access to the accelerator net.
I honestly think there is a cultural silliness in America about soloing it. Everyone who really makes it in America does so in a team, or because their parents boosted them, or whatever. Very few solo. But the dream in America is you do things yourself. The cultural bias towards "paid my way through college", "moved out at 18", "built it on my own with no help from anyone" is a powerful meme but does not confer benefit on the organism holding it.
> I honestly think there is a cultural silliness in America about soloing it.
All tribes that have high trust between them eventually lose it as they economically advance. The high trust between tribe members is required while the tribe members need each other, but once a sufficient number of tribe members become self sufficient, the tribe starts changing into different groups, usually along socioeconomic lines.
Rich people lend and invest with each other all the time. See all the companies where a kid gets funding from his parents friends. But they no longer identify with the immigrant tribe.
I have watched this play out in my lifetime. When everyone in my parents’ immigrant group was poor, everyone was there for everyone. As the decades went on, some families became very successful. Their children no longer associate with the less economically successful families, but they do with those like them. They go on vacations together, golf, invest in businesses together. But the new members of the tribe still immigrating will not get any support from them.
If you know anything about Seattle it can be pretty easily implied what his business actually is doing. He buys gas stations in "up and coming" parts of town with high traffic and makes them safe by driving out the undesirables thereby increasing traffic from the wealthier residents who don't want to be hassled. Seattle has become big and increasingly unsafe so businesses that can provide a sense of security for their customers provide an increasingly better value proposition.
As a fellow Coptic Egyptian, I can tell you that his ability to directly source talent from Coptic Churches in the area is a huge advantage for him.
Just like how warm intros in the VC world signal that the person making the intro can vouch for them as trustworthy, a similar benefit is had when sourcing employees from a tight knit ethno-religious community.
If he hires them to manage a gas station and they steal, cause problems, or anything like that, the community will know about it and their reputation will suffer.
This over-simplifies the nuance. Each business is a little different and it is useful to see exactly how and what is being done. It’s like hiring a business consultant and they tell you a bunch of “obvious” things you are not doing. But you start doing them and your business improves. Maybe you learned something along the way.
But you're missing the nuance that exemplifies the risk. Will sales (on a low-margin product) improve enough to cover the renovation's cost (hundreds of thousands, to million+)? And the additional ongoing costs of running a "spotless" store? Gas station pumps don't wipe themselves down. And can a guy who owns a few dozen stores compete with chains that own hundreds?
> this whole article can be summed up as "providing a better experience for customers can increase sales"
That, plus "be part of a community you can rely on for capital and labor." Despite the many struggles that immigrants face, they do seem to often benefit from being part of a close-knit community.
As an ordinary, middle-class, non-religious white American from a small family, I'm not sure where I'd turn to find such a network. Open to suggestions, though!
A key point is that he gets a reliable stream of motivated immigrant labor to take good care of his stations. Normal owners who hire american teenagers will get worse results. This is why Shell is giving him the red carpet treatment to acquire underperforming gas stations.
Somewhat. Shell is probably trying to position themselves against their competition. Yes, it's probably near zero-sum game, but there's still competition between the various oil companies, etc.
So by having Said take on more stores (due to the quality and volume he proved) means that Shell could take a bigger piece of the pie.
His is certainly an impressive story, but you also have to account for the fact that a lot of the neighborhoods in which he owns gas stations have seen massive inflows of money from Seattle's insane growth in the last 25 years.
It is so random the Egyptian-related posts that come up here!
The irony here is that most of these principles Sami Said uses are not applied in Egypt and I doubt they would work quite the same. Most gas stations for normal, working class people are dirty and IIRC many do not have convenience stores at all. Kiosks are on almost every street corner, so the gas stations would be wasting their employee time as everyone else, car or not, can find those way more easily.
The one exception in upper class neighborhoods and the ring roads that lead between Cairo and major cities, and the gas station rest stops, which have been cleaned up/modernized a lot since my first entry into Egypt in the middle of the last decade. The new cleaner gas stations started showing up then, but now I see many more of them when traveling between cities or the rich/expat-accommodating neighborhoods of Cairo proper (Zamalek, the fancy parts of Ma'adi, et cetera) all of them with On the Run convenience stores. After reading this I Googled, only to discover that is the import of an international chain, Exxon!
So beyond hiring other Egyptians (this is not surprising for Americans who see this with many different immigrant communities, a lot have pointed this out already), not sure why his being Egyptian is an important detail. It sounds like a common American immigrant story to me. This is usually where I make a joke about Neo-Orientalism (perhaps double funny since it is an Egyptian person with gas stations), but the article is pretty germane so what can we really say? lol
This seems like a recipe for success that can be applied in some east european countries still lagging behind the rest of the eu: take old and run down shop in areas with a good potential, provide kick ass services and improve the look and feel of things.
You won't have much of these in (South) Eastern Europe. There is a massive brain drain towards Western Europe... every shop needs customers with spare money to go shopping and that's hard for anything that's not absolute necessities when all working-age people from the area went off to greener grasses.
Originally that was the reason why the EU introduced various funds to improve life/economy in the poorer regions... while for some regions it worked out decently, many others had all the money sucked off to corruption. Between 2013 and 2017, for example, at least 1.5 billion € in development funds were wasted (https://kurier.at/politik/ausland/betrug-mit-eu-foerdergelde...).
I drive an EV so I haven't been to a gas station in years, maybe a decade. However, I think gas stations, maybe this guy, could better serve EVs.
First, we're going to be at a charging station for about a half an hour. In fact, limit us to half an hour. Provide an L3 QC so we can charge. Air so we can top off our tires. Wiper fluid. WIFI. Got a Tesla, CHAdeMO or SAE? Great, we have an adaptor for that. Brownie points for a vac, garbage and recycling.
Charge a flat rate, $20 (?). Got a Tesla? It goes on your account.
The secret to a great gas station business, is being not primarily in the gas station business, but in the higher margin food business.
The Sheetz gas station chain along the US east coast for example has a wildly thriving business and is demolishing every other gas station in its path. ~25 years ago they started doing things quite different than all the other competition and it has led to them building out hundreds of locations. They're up to $7.5 billion in annual sales now. It's all built around great locations (of course) and the margins in their food making business. They did touch screen ordering kiosks as early as any other major food-related chain in the US, and 20+ years before McDonald's deployed them widely. The gas merely draws traffic, there's no serious money in that part of the business.
It's remarkable how unfriendly large gas stations have come to be. Locally all our Speedways have added TV's at the pumps that play Speedway commercials non-stop.
They're all out of sync and it gives you a headache to listen to all of them. It annoyed me so much that I did some googling and I figured out how to turn down the volume ;<). But they had a software update and my little trick no longer worked.
But the TV's didn't increase store sales so you know what they did? They cranked up the volume to an ear splitting level;<(. It's almost as if they're trying to drive customers away.
The faster you get your gas and go, the quicker the next person in line can get their gas. Imagine all the people who see a full gas station and keep driving knowing they could get gas later when the station is less full. Gas stations almost need to appear empty at the pumps.
Most interesting. I wouldn't have thought any of those little details matter, so I guess I am not representative of the market.
I never shop at the gas station convenience store (unless traveling and in need of water). I pick a gas station solely on convenience factor, ie closest to me on the correct side of the road. The only criteria I have is that I do not use gas stations (Arco) that have central payment islands vs pay at the pump.
I'm pretty amazed anyone cares what gas station they go to, and actually pick one over another.
I don't drive so I rarely step into a petrol station but whenever I do it's almost always: wtf?? It's like most operators try to make them as inconvenient as possible.Poor selection of products on shelves, toilets often not clean/locked,etc. No wonder this man is so successful.
[+] [-] dmix|6 years ago|reply
This is what most UX designers do for a living. They think about the small details which get overlooked while everyone is in a rush to build out x feature/functionality.
It's what creates emotional connections to products and services which builds strong customer loyalty and helps word of mouth.
Just like how they used to know your name at your local small grocery store, those intimate details go a long way. And in commoditized situations people are willing to spend more time/money or go out of their way to use your product.
Dan Norman talks a lot about this in his "Emotional Design" book. It's the design stuff that goes beyond merely functionality and most efficient problem solving (ie, obsessing about fewest clicks to do x, instead of the wider experience where adding a communication step might improve the emotional experience).
But often it is a luxury for many smaller firms struggling to just get the functionality part right, which is why this person buying up gas stations, providing time and capital, and giving them the attention they needed is working so well.
[+] [-] doodliego|6 years ago|reply
If UX designers made a gas pump, it would be a featureless white pillar with a single button and a hose and it wouldn't work.
[+] [-] wpietri|6 years ago|reply
Ultimately, we make things that serve other people. All of us need to pay attention to how our work impacts the users we serve. Experts can help with that, but the Lone Design Ranger isn't nearly as powerful as a cross-functional, user-focused team.
I would also suggest that at least in tech, smaller firms aren't the problem here. As you say yourself, the small, neighborhood grocery store can get this stuff right just by paying attention. I think the big problems come at scale, where managerialism and over-focused metrics can easily disempower people and get them focused on the wrong thing.
[+] [-] cushychicken|6 years ago|reply
Additionally - it also shows how there are things that you never expect that have a positive impact. Suggests to me that there are so many factors that affect people's product choices, and that many of the factors that drive a certain choice are not fully understood by either the buyer or the seller.
[+] [-] andonisus|6 years ago|reply
To be clear, I am not saying that UX as whole is not needed, but I do not need someone who has made a career of it to elucidate me on the finer points of emotionally connecting with a user via tooltips and the like.
[+] [-] bitexploder|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] WalterBright|6 years ago|reply
When I was in college, there was a small restaurant nearby, Burger Continental. The owner knew us students, and when ordering he'd always upgrade our orders for free, usually with a big flourish. We knew why he was doing it, but we still enjoyed him doing it and patronized his establishment a lot.
[+] [-] bitexploder|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lotsofpulp|6 years ago|reply
It depends if your customer has money to spare and/or if they value the improvements. Walmart succeeded precisely because people don't care about anything other than price for commodities.
[+] [-] jariel|6 years ago|reply
Assuming it's not product or price, it's interesting to note how a professional appearance makes the difference.
[+] [-] partyboat1586|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aresant|6 years ago|reply
As the article explains the owner is drawing his HR from the Egyptian immigrant community.
As such I think the “secret” of success in this tale is the unique funnel he has developed to find motivated, highly responsible, and respectful labor.
Which is almost impossible to find in the US at this point with employment reaching all time highs.
Good lesson for anybody that thinks the “buy and improve” strategy is going to come from giving a near minimum wage worker a playbook and checking in once a month.
[+] [-] redis_mlc|6 years ago|reply
2) The article has a good explanation of how an immigrant community works together to dominate a niche using a favorable banking tie and a labor stream. A similar story is that most Bay Area motels are operated by Gujaratis (fixed), and in Canada minimarts by Koreans. Both have strong banking ties for pre-approved loans based on sufficient family labor and the community track record.
3) The Albanian resistance movement in the last Serbian war was funded by a small construction firm in New York. The owner fed back enough weapons and snipers to ground the UN helicopters (!) persecuting them, as well as lobby in DC. There's a very impressive video online.
[+] [-] rossdavidh|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Andrew_nenakhov|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] closeparen|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thrwn_frthr_awy|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] esotericn|6 years ago|reply
You would have slightly fewer drivers as people would charge at home. However, that's probably a low percentage of the total.
For those that stick around, the duration of a visit will generally increase (filling up 200 miles worth of petrol takes less time than 200 miles charge, even at 100kW or more).
I'm more likely to buy something at somewhere I perceive to be 'overpriced' if I'm there for longer, want somewhere nice to sit and eat, etc.
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] tyingq|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] simonh|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] leeoniya|6 years ago|reply
https://imgur.com/UxlaMi7
i snapped it as proof else no one would believe me, like grainy, destabilized bigfoot footage.
[+] [-] bluedino|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] appleshore|6 years ago|reply
Verse a system that offers fair pricing, healthy options, positive re-enforcement, incentivizes public facing employees to learn CPR and first aid, paying higher wages to help upward mobility and savings, creating a place for community interaction.
Nope, it’s just sugar, cigarettes, “rhino” pills, alcohol, mistreated underpaid employees living a fraction of their potential, dirtiness and no bathrooms.
[+] [-] Nasrudith|6 years ago|reply
In whole those requests aren't a cohesive strategy, or even a collection of separate ones "competing" for balance but a wish list. Paying higher wages to ensure quality of workers for lessened expenses or better effective throughput is a strategy. Just paying higher wages isn't a strategy, it is an out of context goal for a business model. At best it would be an alternate profit distribution which would make it and be peripheral to what makes an enterprise work.
Starting with the end in mind is a good concept but a viable path to get there is needed or else it will end in failure and tears.
On another note fair prices aren't a real thing economically. Despite efforts from medieval times to failed Communist attempts at solving a valuation problem. Fair is a judgement which may be anywhere from well informed to utterly insane.
[+] [-] kyrieeschaton|6 years ago|reply
"in 1998, he scraped together the $75,000 down payment, much of it from family and others in the local Egyptian community"
"One key factor: Said staffed his new location with fellow immigrants from his church, Saint Mary Coptic Orthodox Church in Lynnwood"
"with the help of a broker — another member of the local Egyptian community — Said got a loan and closed the deal"
"Mainly, Said checks in with his managers and staff, many of whom are Egyptian immigrants looking for their own start in America. Many are referred to Said through his church or the local Egyptian American community; some hear of Said even before they leave Egypt."
[+] [-] scarejunba|6 years ago|reply
It works even for non-business. Immigrants will lend each other money for mortgage down payments, cars, exercising options, investments, cover expenses until long term cap gains, etc. in amounts most Americans would balk at. Easy six figure sums with no real collateral. If the investment pays off or whatever, the person loaning doesn't get a percentage or anything like that. All they get is what they already have: continued access to the accelerator net.
I honestly think there is a cultural silliness in America about soloing it. Everyone who really makes it in America does so in a team, or because their parents boosted them, or whatever. Very few solo. But the dream in America is you do things yourself. The cultural bias towards "paid my way through college", "moved out at 18", "built it on my own with no help from anyone" is a powerful meme but does not confer benefit on the organism holding it.
[+] [-] lotsofpulp|6 years ago|reply
All tribes that have high trust between them eventually lose it as they economically advance. The high trust between tribe members is required while the tribe members need each other, but once a sufficient number of tribe members become self sufficient, the tribe starts changing into different groups, usually along socioeconomic lines.
Rich people lend and invest with each other all the time. See all the companies where a kid gets funding from his parents friends. But they no longer identify with the immigrant tribe.
I have watched this play out in my lifetime. When everyone in my parents’ immigrant group was poor, everyone was there for everyone. As the decades went on, some families became very successful. Their children no longer associate with the less economically successful families, but they do with those like them. They go on vacations together, golf, invest in businesses together. But the new members of the tribe still immigrating will not get any support from them.
[+] [-] llrando|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] KoftaBob|6 years ago|reply
Just like how warm intros in the VC world signal that the person making the intro can vouch for them as trustworthy, a similar benefit is had when sourcing employees from a tight knit ethno-religious community.
If he hires them to manage a gas station and they steal, cause problems, or anything like that, the community will know about it and their reputation will suffer.
[+] [-] brenden2|6 years ago|reply
Also I think this whole article can be summed up as "providing a better experience for customers can increase sales".
[+] [-] bitexploder|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] listenallyall|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thatsenough|6 years ago|reply
That, plus "be part of a community you can rely on for capital and labor." Despite the many struggles that immigrants face, they do seem to often benefit from being part of a close-knit community.
As an ordinary, middle-class, non-religious white American from a small family, I'm not sure where I'd turn to find such a network. Open to suggestions, though!
[+] [-] aga98mtl|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] megablast|6 years ago|reply
Right, but what does that actually mean. What is he actually doing to make the businesses more attractive to customers.
[+] [-] jeffdavis|6 years ago|reply
Isn't this zero sum? If one station doesn't sell the gasoline, another will, right? Why does the refiner care who sells it?
[+] [-] taftster|6 years ago|reply
So by having Said take on more stores (due to the quality and volume he proved) means that Shell could take a bigger piece of the pie.
[+] [-] kyleblarson|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 616c|6 years ago|reply
The irony here is that most of these principles Sami Said uses are not applied in Egypt and I doubt they would work quite the same. Most gas stations for normal, working class people are dirty and IIRC many do not have convenience stores at all. Kiosks are on almost every street corner, so the gas stations would be wasting their employee time as everyone else, car or not, can find those way more easily.
The one exception in upper class neighborhoods and the ring roads that lead between Cairo and major cities, and the gas station rest stops, which have been cleaned up/modernized a lot since my first entry into Egypt in the middle of the last decade. The new cleaner gas stations started showing up then, but now I see many more of them when traveling between cities or the rich/expat-accommodating neighborhoods of Cairo proper (Zamalek, the fancy parts of Ma'adi, et cetera) all of them with On the Run convenience stores. After reading this I Googled, only to discover that is the import of an international chain, Exxon!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Run_(convenience_store)
So beyond hiring other Egyptians (this is not surprising for Americans who see this with many different immigrant communities, a lot have pointed this out already), not sure why his being Egyptian is an important detail. It sounds like a common American immigrant story to me. This is usually where I make a joke about Neo-Orientalism (perhaps double funny since it is an Egyptian person with gas stations), but the article is pretty germane so what can we really say? lol
[+] [-] ossworkerrights|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mschuster91|6 years ago|reply
You won't have much of these in (South) Eastern Europe. There is a massive brain drain towards Western Europe... every shop needs customers with spare money to go shopping and that's hard for anything that's not absolute necessities when all working-age people from the area went off to greener grasses.
Originally that was the reason why the EU introduced various funds to improve life/economy in the poorer regions... while for some regions it worked out decently, many others had all the money sucked off to corruption. Between 2013 and 2017, for example, at least 1.5 billion € in development funds were wasted (https://kurier.at/politik/ausland/betrug-mit-eu-foerdergelde...).
[+] [-] CalChris|6 years ago|reply
First, we're going to be at a charging station for about a half an hour. In fact, limit us to half an hour. Provide an L3 QC so we can charge. Air so we can top off our tires. Wiper fluid. WIFI. Got a Tesla, CHAdeMO or SAE? Great, we have an adaptor for that. Brownie points for a vac, garbage and recycling.
Charge a flat rate, $20 (?). Got a Tesla? It goes on your account.
[+] [-] adventured|6 years ago|reply
The Sheetz gas station chain along the US east coast for example has a wildly thriving business and is demolishing every other gas station in its path. ~25 years ago they started doing things quite different than all the other competition and it has led to them building out hundreds of locations. They're up to $7.5 billion in annual sales now. It's all built around great locations (of course) and the margins in their food making business. They did touch screen ordering kiosks as early as any other major food-related chain in the US, and 20+ years before McDonald's deployed them widely. The gas merely draws traffic, there's no serious money in that part of the business.
[+] [-] rmason|6 years ago|reply
They're all out of sync and it gives you a headache to listen to all of them. It annoyed me so much that I did some googling and I figured out how to turn down the volume ;<). But they had a software update and my little trick no longer worked.
But the TV's didn't increase store sales so you know what they did? They cranked up the volume to an ear splitting level;<(. It's almost as if they're trying to drive customers away.
[+] [-] latchkey|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jiveturkey|6 years ago|reply
I never shop at the gas station convenience store (unless traveling and in need of water). I pick a gas station solely on convenience factor, ie closest to me on the correct side of the road. The only criteria I have is that I do not use gas stations (Arco) that have central payment islands vs pay at the pump.
I'm pretty amazed anyone cares what gas station they go to, and actually pick one over another.
[+] [-] vpribish|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] regnarg|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cosmodisk|6 years ago|reply