[Dion]

Dan McTeague, Senior Petroleum Analyst with Gasbuddy.com says while some are blaming the Heritage Day long weekend for the jump at the pump, there's a lot more at play.

He shares wholesale prices have slowly been creeping up in the past three weeks, which means gas stations are paying higher wholesale prices.

"If I'm a gas station owner anywhere in southern Alberta it's costing me about 92-93 cents a litre to buy my fuel," he says. "Now surprise, surprise, the only one selling in retail what it costs in wholesale is Costco, everyone else has had to go up, because you can't operate a gas station unless you have a lot of other goods to sell and use as a loss leader. It has nothing to do with the long weekend, far more to do with the fact that many retailers were holding out until the bitter end trying to maintain some semblance of competition, but most had to throw the towel in this week."

McTeague says gas stations raising prices just before the long weekend is to protect business, with more people taking to the roads, and stations losing money on gasoline sales, someone had to wave a white flag.

"Unless you have a rich uncle, or a generous bank, you're owned by a refinery, or you own a big box store in which you can sell to compensate for the loss, you can run out of business pretty fast selling gasoline for wholesale price."

https://www.highriveronline.com/loca...pump-this-week