Abstract

The fact that a lot of people in Poland travel by car creates a lot of different business opportunities for the retail sector. Petrol stations are among various entities that attempt to take advantage of this situation. The main purpose of this article is to identify and assess the behaviour of petrol station customers in Poland regarding their motivations for choosing particular facilities and their non-fuel purchases. The study is based on results of a CAWI survey of 603 customers. To make sure that sample was representative, its composition was controlled in terms of the following respondent variables: sex, age, size of the town of residence and province. Consumer behaviour can be affected by a number of factors but only some of them could be addressed in the study, which can be regarded as one of its biggest limitations. Nevertheless, the results provide an interesting insight on this topic. The main contributions of the study include the creation of a typology of petrol stations, identification and assessment of consumer motives for selecting a given facility and information about non-fuel purchases made by customers. The most frequent motives for selecting a given petrol station include convenient location, brand, and the price of petrol and other products. In addition to fuel, customers usually stop to buy coffee and fast food, alcoholic beverages and basic groceries. The authors discuss statistically significant differences between different types of petrol stations in the above mentioned respects. The results of the survey can be of interest to owners of petrol stations as guidance on how to adjust their marketing strategies, especially in terms of the composition of their offering. (original abstract)