Opinion: The next big innovation in grocery-petrol convenience

Is there a more brilliant con in the world today than the self-serve checkout? Supermarkets get you to spend more time queuing to scan your own items so they can spend less on staff, and then they tell you it’s for your own convenience. It’s like a mugger expecting you to tip him.

But don’t give supermarkets all the credit for their evil genius. It’s a trick they learned from petrol stations. Every other business in the world is focused on taking hassle and responsibility away from you, but supermarkets and petrol stations are the opposite. Buying groceries and buying petrol are the only businesses in the world where companies are heaping more and more of the grunt work onto the consumer.

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Once upon a time, you pulled into a petrol station and someone else filled your tank for you. (In a few places, they still do that; it’s an uncomfortable feeling, on par with having a stranger cut up your dinner and feed you.) But now petrol stations are pretty much all self-service, and the things they call “conveniences” are actually just the chance to do more chores yourself. It’s like an anti-service industry.

“Hey, since you’re here, why not clean your own windscreen, and make yourself a coffee, and heat yourself up a burrito, and then clean the microwave when you’re done? And after you’re done paying us for that, the back office needs a vacuum, and Tony at the check-out could use a neck massage. No need to thank us; it’s all part of the anti-service.”

Other places try to make your life easier: shopping centres now have valet parking, and car washes are now valet-service cafes. But the petrol station attendants just sit there, watching smugly while you do everything yourself. They’re only there to take your money, and then tell you that you’re not allowed to use the toilet, as it’s for employees only. Because they trust you to pump high-pressure flammable liquids on your own, but not to take a whiz.

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The only “innovation” in the petrol station world is – yep – the mini-supermarket, which just creates other headaches for you. Like when you’re done pumping and paying, only to find another car waiting behind you, and the person at the pump in front of you is spending way too long inside trying to decide between white bread and multigrain. (Here’s a hint: never choose multigrain. Screw multigrain.)
Supermarkets and petrol stations go together like Frankenstein and the Bride of Frankenstein.

After you’ve finished scanning your own groceries, you get one of those cheap petrol dockets, which you dutifully stuff in your centre console but never actually use, because who drives 15 minutes out of their way to save 60 cents on petrol? I know who. The same people who will wait 10 minutes for a space right outside a shop door to save a 30-second walk from the other side of the parking lot.

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So to the marketing guy at Woolies or Coles or wherever, take an extra-long coffee break this morning, because I’ve done your job for you today. The next big innovation in the grocery-petrol continuum: petrol valets at supermarket carparks.

Instead of a little supermarket inside a petrol station, put a petrol pump inside a supermarket carpark, with petrol valets right by the front doors. Drop your car, go shop, and by the time you come out, the valet has gone and filled your tank for you.

This will be the ultimate in convenience, at least until Silicon Valley comes up with the Uber Fuel Tanker. It’s the next logical step after Uber Eats: you order a fuel pumper to swing by your driveway before you leave for work, while you’re inside waiting patiently for the petrol guy to ask if he can use your bathroom, so you can tell him no, it’s for customers only. Ah, sweet revenge.