A Study on Value Added Service in Fuel Retailing: Impacting Consumer Buying Behavior

Abstract

The oil and gas industry sector is one of the six core industries in India. The oil & gas industry is divided into the three streams those are upstream, midstream and downstream. The upstream of oil & gas sector deals with the exploration and production of crude oil & gas; the midstream deals with the movement of materials through pipelines rail trucks and vessels and the downstream sector takes care of the marketing of petroleum products through retail stations or outlets. In general term the fuel-retailing business is the selling of fuel products through the outlets. In Fuel retailing business, the refined products are directly being sold to the consumers. There is extensive rivalry for oil marketing companies due to entry of private players like reliance, shell, Essar etc., to interact the consumers these companies provide some value added services like ATM's, convenience store, fleet cards etc. The value-added selling concept has been a popular one from many years. Today's markets scenario is such where so many products and services are available to the customer to choose, therefore the ability to add value to the product or service is an absolute necessity to attract the customer.