May 22, 2008

High Prices are Bad for Business

As all of you know, the price of biodiesel at the pump has hit record highs. Over the past few months by phone, email, blog responses, and in person, most people have been asking me "why?"

It is a complicated issue - take a look at previous posts - but there is one large piece that I've been leaving out:
the impact high prices have had on SeQuential.

On the financial side of things,
we have lost volume and customers. Some people are driving less and others have gone back to petroleum fuels. The price increases have reflected the rising cost of biodiesel - not rising profit margins. The lost volume means SeQuential is struggling .

On the other side of things, I have heard disbelief at the speed and intensity of price increases; questions on price gouging and comparisons to big oil have been made.
This stings - SeQuential is a very small company (there are six of us in full-time administrative positions); both as a company and as individuals, we are committed to making cleaner burning, renewable fuels available. This is not an easy task given who and what we are up against and the only way we can do this is with help from our customers.

We are in business to make a difference: to move towards energy independence, to clean up the air, to give people a choice when they fuel their cars. Stay with the right biofuels. When you fuel up with SeQuential, you are supporting a different kind of fuel and a different kind of fuel company: local, cleaner, better.