NOTE ACCEPTOR PETROL PUMP-G. MAYHEW

clear of the highway and its accesses should be designed to give the best possible visibility. If possible, the width of the access should be about 24ft. and the radii of the curves at the entrance and exit about 35ft. If reasonably practicable, it should be designed for one way working through the station, with the pumps sited as near the exit as possible in order to ensure that the vehicles will not stand on the carriageway while waiting to be refuelled.

Question of Need

The Minister has been asked how far need should be taken into account by a Local Planning Authority in considering an application for a petrol station. The Minister thinks that to set up a control based entirely on considerations of need under which applications might be rejected even where there were no amenity, traffic or other planning objections, would go beyond the proper scope of planning. But there will very often be some planning objection, even though it may not be such as to rule out the proposal without further argument. Where there is, the question of traffic need can properly be considered; and if no strong case is made out on grounds of traffic need, then the planning objections may become decisive. In this context, the Minister would not regard the absence of a pump supplying a particular brand of petrol as constituting of itself a need for another station. "The community as a whole has a right to expect that users of the road and those who minister to their needs do not despoil the country by shoddy and tasteless buildings and ugly advertisements. The wide powers vested in Local Authorities under the Town and Country Planning Acts are evidence of the national conscience in this matter. Again the community has a right to demand that the safety of those who use the road should not be endangered by ill-sited service stations with awkward entrances and exits".

That is an extract from a booklet issued some years ago by one of the major oil companies. If it were adhered to by all concerned in this problem, the Planning Authorities would be delighted.

Note Acceptor Petrol Pump

Geoffrey Mayhew, Public Relations Officer for the BP Retail Division, writes on plans for self-help marketing

The next few years will see motorists applying the do-ityourself technique when calling at filling stations for petrol and oil. Self-service at the filling stations is beginning to emerge as a sophisticated, attractive development which can offer advantages to the motorist. BP is in the forefront with three important experiments.

The most fascinating of these is the note-acceptor machine which pockets the motorist's £1 note and dispenses £1 's ':"orth of petrol. It is a flexible machine, too. If the motorist does not want that much fuel the machine will give ten shillings worth and four in change. A receipt is always included.

The BP Retail Market Division of Shell-Mex and BP plans to this machine for petrol retailing to the Umted Kmgdom m 1966 and a company site in Watford has for the experiment. It will be t.he. first of ever carried out in this country. A similar machme 1s m operation in Sweden but apart fron:i that they unknown anywhere in the world for use m petrol reta1hng. before the site for experiment has been built., the. BP note-acceptor machine has caught the public as a forward-looking move to keep abreast of the mcreasmg of demand from the increasing number of motonsts.

BP self-service experiments began in the United Kingdom in March, 1965. The marketers had been appraising for some time pointers which indicated a growing public interest in self-service as a straight service and not simply as a reduced or second-class method of attending to customers. Remarks made to dealers by customers, remarks made by dealers, letters from motorists about selfservice they had experienced abroad and, of course, the statistics relating to peak-hour filling station traffic of the future produced an interesting picture for those whose business life is the promotion of service for motorists.

The experience gained by BP marketing companies in other countries in self-service fitted like a well cut dove-tail into the attitude which was now discerned in the United Kingdom market. In Western Germany, BP has 2,000 pumps on coin-operated sites which are unattended at night. During the day the pumps are operated conventionally. These have become extremely popular with distance as well as neighbourhood motorists. The service works easily and is a business getter, particularly at night when, but for the automatically-operated, self-service pumps, it would not be economic to keep stations open. In Stockholm, a capital whose high standard of living is renowned, fifty per cent of filling stations are now selfservice.

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The result of this perception of a new market, on the one hand, and the availability of marketing experience, on the other, led to one of the most interesting experiments in marketing carried out by Shell-Mex and BP.

At Knighton, Buckhurst Hill, Essex, the BP self-service experimental station was opened in March last year. This is an experiment on the principle of post-payment selfservice, whereas the note-acceptor experiment planned for 1966 will be pre-payment self-service.

The Knighton station is a spacious, well-designed site where the pumps are under cover and alongside a selfservice shop supplying many types of accessories which are placed on super-market-type shelves. Signs invite the passing motorist to drive in and serve himself and then pay a woman cashier for his purchases at the kiosk which is part of the shop.

The pumps beside which the motorist parks his car are standard Wayne pumps. The motorist takes the hose, inserts it into his car's tank and delivers as many gallons as he wishes. While the petrol flows the gallons and also the price are shown in the normal way on the pump head. A repeater device in the kiosk tells the cashier how much petrol the motorist is taking and what the price is. So when the motorist comes to the kiosk window his bill is waiting for him.

Should the motorist need oil he helps himself to a tin on the forecourt and pours its contents into his car's sump. During the coming year this form of motor oil self-service is to be improved. In future the motorist wishing to buy motor oil will be invited to push a button and ring up the cashier on an inter-corn which is built into the pump. He will say Visco-Static on the broadcast. The attendant will then press a switch which will release from a stand a can containing the right amount of oil of his choice.

Self-service car washing at 2s., a do-it-yourself Vacumobile for the interior of the car at 6d. and a self-service paraffin dispenser which delivers in two shilling amounts are also available at Knighton. And if the motorist wants a hot drink or a snack or confectionery there is a vending bank beside which he may park his car while making his purchase. Prices range from one shilling to two shillings for confectionery and snacks. Cigarette machines are also installed.

This self-service site is open from 7 a.m. until 11 p.m. seven days a week and one of a staff of three is on duty all the time. They are alert to provide service to the motorist, although the emphasis remains on self-service and the effect of self-service.

How are these effects assessed ?

In a number of ways, because the marketers want every useful scrap of information they can get about how selfservice goes. They know that this method of dealing with customers is still in its early days and that there is much to learn. They assess the volume of business, of course, and compare it with the flow of business at similar sites of a conventional kind elsewhere in the country. They also like to know exactly what the customer thinks about the self-service station. At certain intervals motorists calling at Knighton are interviewed on the forecourt by research experts who find their job made pleasant as well as easy by the fact that the motorists appear to enjoy taking part in this exercise.

Questions such as: "Why have you come here?" "Do you mind serving yourself?" "Why do you like-or not like-serving yourself?" "Are the instructions easy to understand?" "Would you come again ? " are put to the motorists.

The sale of every type of merchandise at the station is watched, as well as the use made of the forecourt area, the placing of signs and their effect and the access of the shop to the customer. A great deal has been learned in the few months since the site went into business.

Now plans are in hand to develop a second site of the Knighton kind in Northern England during 1966. Knighton station is in a residential neighbourhood. The one in Northern England will be in a more industrial area. Useful comparisons will be possible.

At Elmbridge, near Bognor, a BP dealer, Mr. J. T. Cate, is carrying out an experiment using the Wayne coinoperated self-service pump. Last spring an ordinary type of pump which had one particular difference was installed. It was fitted with a machine which would convert the pump into an automatic one by the simple process of turning a small key. During the day Mr. Cate's attendants serve the· passing trade from this pump in the conventional way. But at night, at the time when the station used to close, Mr. Cate turns the key and the pump then becomes available for automatic self-service by any motorist. He obtained permission from Chichester Rural District Council to leave his station unattended during this selfservice period of the night. Motorists see that the filling station's lights are still on and if they want petrol they drive in and read the instructions on the automatic pump. They are asked to put in two half-crowns at a time in order to serve themselves with five shillings worth of petrol. Many do this.

Mr. Cate has done a reasonable business with this dev!ce si~ce he inst~lled it as an experiment. All the busmess 1s new busmess but without the coin-operated pump he would not have been able to justify emergency service of this kind.

His experience high-lights one field in which self-service will probably spread rapidly. Each year the roads take !llore ~nd more t~affic at night, a development w~ich 1s parti.cularly noticeable during holiday periods. N1g~t traf:Iic 1s. encouraged by the road organisations and, m hob.day tJm~s, also b~ the police. The percentage of filling ~tat10ns which remam _open at night to serve this traffic 1s, ~owever, ~omparatively low. There is not enough busme~s, and m many areas there is the added difficulty of findmg the extra staff to man the station even to test the night business. ' . Clearly the coin-opera.ted and the note-acceptor machmes could help to J?rov1de an emergency service where no~e would other~1se be possible. Another field for th~ir deve!opment is undoubtedly that of the peak hour fillmg station traffic, when, despite all hands being to the pumps, the dealer cannot cope with the traffic as fast as he wishes and as a result loses trade. The use of an automatic pump, w~ich could also be operated at night, would, in these periods, probably be a considerable asset. ~ill a note-acceptor machine be more popular ~han .the corn-operated pump ? The arguments are easy to 1magme. The motorist is more likely to have a £1 note than a pocket full of half crowns. But is it not likely that the note-

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