Z Energy has won the contract for to supply New World and Pak 'n Save branded service stations, taking the contract from rival Mobil. From September this year, the 53 petrol stations in the Foodstuffs network will take Z's fuel, and supermarket customers will be able to redeem loyalty points at Z stations.
Z estimates the new deal will increase volumes by 150 million litres a year, although Z chief executive Mike Bennetts didn't put a dollar value on the partnership. However he doesn't expect Z to make money out of the deal in the current financial year because of the set-up costs .
Bennetts says the deal is one of six the company has been working on, and it will be in a position to name and quantify the other five, "if there is indeed still five", at its half-year earnings announcement. "It has been a long time coming from our perspective. We have a relationship with Foodstuffs through the FlyBuys activity we do, and in our own ways, each of us were frustrated around having a different relationship when it comes to fuel," he says.
Bennetts says the contract came to market in the past couple of months, as it does periodically. He wouldn't reveal how long the contract will last for commercial sensitivity reasons, but said it was a "medium term" contract and Z won't have to bid for it annually.
Meanwhile Z, which today reported increased revenue and profits for the latest financial year, has reiterated its view that the petrol market is competitive. The fuel industry has come under fire this week after a leaked email from BP revealed that company's pricing tactics, prompting Energy Minister Megan Woods to call in BP to explain.
The sector was already under scrutiny after a fuelmarket study last year found New Zealand's petrol market may not be competitive, with retail margins increasing over the past five years while more expensive petrol in the South Island and Wellington aren't explained by higher costs in those areas.
Bennetts says the difference between the cheapest petrol and the most expensive petrol across the Z network was 20 cents per litre, as of yesterday, and that difference "exists in Auckland as much as across the country."
"This isn't a situation of provinces crossubsidising urban centres, this is all about local individual trading markets competing fiercely on a s-site-by-site basis," Bennetts says.
"Up until a couple of weeks ago, the cheapest place in New Zealand to get petrol - certainly in the Z network - was Invercargill, not in one of the traditional hotspots around discounting. That's moved, the current cheapest place to get petrol in the Z network is Levin. The market is moving a great deal.
"Part of the reason of pointing to Invercargill is it's not a market where we've observed the 'Gull effect'. It certainly is an example of there being a lot more competition beyond companies like ourselves, and that manifests in price and non-price offers," Bennetts said, adding that 20 percent of industry sales go through smaller independent brands.
Z Energy's results for the year to March 31 show revenue surged 18 percent to $4.57 billion. Net profit rose 8 percent to $263 million, while replacement cost operating earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and financial adjustments - a measure Z uses to strip out the changing value of inventory - rose 13 percent to $449 million.
The company says it has been moving away from an asset-led strategy to one which is capability-led through what it is calling its Strategy 3.0 project. That has included its Fastlane trial, where customers can buy petrol without leaving their cars; identifying 1.6 million unique named customers and 40,000 unique named commercial/SME customers; and building a predictive model for customers at risk of churn.
"It's really important we've got this, it's a great example of strategy in action," Bennetts says. "We've always said that we would prefer an asset-light, structural growth in volumes rather than putting lots of new service stations down on the ground: we don't think that's the way for a company like us to participate going forward. Structural changes that are asset- or capital-light are the best thing for us to do."
Share this:
