Get Together and Save
A few neighbours getting together to order heating oil makes excellent sense. They can buy smaller quantities and get the benefit of a price based on a much larger load size. Don’t get too ambitious though. Once the total volume exceeds 8 or 9,000 litres, the capacity of one small tanker, or the deliveries are too spread out, the advantage is lost. Some buying groups have a large number of members and use their total buying power as a lever to force distributors to sell at uneconomical rates. Some large multinational distributors see this as an opportunity to try force the smaller supplier out of business. Taking this to its ultimate conclusion, you could be left with a very small number of large distributors from which to buy your oil.
Large buying groups
We actively encourage small delivery based buying groups and take the view that they can be extremely beneficial to the customer. However, the much larger groups can prove difficult to manage and could lead to the consumer not getting the level of service or value that they deserve. We are concerned that they may not serve the long term interests of our customers.
The Facts
