Make sense of evolving behavior at your stations to form habits that last, turning infrequent customers into your customers.
Fuel retailers work hard to attract new customers — but what happens after those first few visits? As multi-regional independents expand into new markets and overall fuel consumption continues to decline, retention is getting more and more challenging.
Upside’s latest research report, Winning the Uncommitted Customer, uncovered that three in four fuel customers are uncommitted, meaning that they spread their trips around as they prioritize their own needs. Without the right incentives, they can’t be relied upon to come back for future visits.
The missed opportunity here is substantial: based on the number of trips these customers take each month and the share of revenue they represent for the average fuel retailer, just one more monthly visit from uncommitted customers could result in an 88% increase in annual revenue.
Who’s the uncommitted customer?
Uncommitted customers are not a niche segment, but a majority. They’re not defined demographically — an uncommitted customer can look like anyone. Rather, they’re defined by how they behave:
- Value-seeking: Uncommitted customers are price-sensitive, but “value” constitutes a lot more than just price. They make buying decisions that fit best into their lives based on price, convenience, quality, and more.
- Digital: Uncommitted customers make buying decisions online, and their phones are never far from their fingertips. More than 70% of fuel customers say they have compared prices online before choosing where to fill up.
- Opportunistic: Uncommitted customers often decide where to fill up while they’re on the go — sometimes hours or even minutes before. In fact, 77% of our survey respondents said they decide where to go less than two hours before fueling.
Overcoming the month-one retention hurdle
Much of the conversation around winning customers is dedicated to acquisition — and while that’s essential, a first visit doesn’t necessarily guarantee a second. In fact, 64% of new fuel customers stop coming back to a site after their first month.
As we expand out to all customers — not just new ones — we see a similar pattern. Without loyalty or another engagement program, 53% of fuel customers transacting in a given month stop coming back after one month.
Loyalty programs do improve retention, and retailers’ efforts on this front are worth celebrating. Compared to more than half of the general population, only 20% of loyalty program members who transact in a given month won’t be back the following month — a 33-point improvement. But that still means one in five walk away, which means there’s an opportunity to get more of these uncommitted customers into your loyalty program and visiting more frequently.
So, what’s the solution? Retailers have to expand their reach — getting in front of more customers, both new and existing, more of the time. From there, it’s about building habits with their customers, powered by tools that work in real time and align with how uncommitted customers shop. And while those habit formation efforts should start right after the very first transaction, that’s not where they end. It’s an ongoing battle to win each successive visit.
That’s because repeat visits improve retention over time. In other words, each time a customer comes back, they’re more likely to keep coming back. After one year, 45% of your regular customers will still be your customers — a 30-point improvement over new customers.
Turn uncommitted customers into your customers.
Winning more visits from uncommitted customers isn’t just a nice-to-have — it’s one of the clearest paths to meaningful, sustainable growth in today’s fuel retail landscape. By understanding how these customers behave and giving them reasons to return, retailers can unlock new revenue without adding operational complexity or slashing margins.
Winning the Uncommitted Customer has more — click here to get your copy of the full report.
