Fillups now a thing of the past
Robert Johnson made as if to cry as he gassed up at the BP station at 35th and King Drive, where unleaded regular has hit $3.99 a gallon.
The soaring cast of gasoline is eating up a bigger chunk of the tips that Johnson, 22, gets as a cashier at Wrigley Field. That's prompting him to make some changes.
(Tom Cruze/Sun-Times)
"It's tough," said Johnson, the father of a 1-year-old and 2-month-old. "I've got to save a lot of money, cut down on stuff that I really don't need."
Like clothes, he said. His 1995 GMC Safari costs about $100 to fill up. So he rarely does: "I'll put $20 to $25 in. I try to cut down on driving."
A lot of people are like that, said Shinto Thomas, a cashier at the station. "Nowadays, people aren't filling up," Thomas said. "They used to fill up. Now, it's $10 or $15."
Sales are down at gas stations across the state, according to William Fleischli, executive vice president of the Illinois Petroleum Marketers Association, which represents about 85 percent of gas stations statewide.
"People are not filling up," said Fleischli, "or they're not driving as much."
