Originally Posted By: Stu_Rock
The person who owns the gas station sets the price. He does not work for Exxon; he is just a franchisee. Exxon has no control over the retailer's markup.
Exxon does not own any more retail stations, and none of them are franchises. Apparently retail gas-station margins are too thin to justify Exxon allocating company resources to running them, so they sold them off.
Exxon stations are now owned and operated by several unrelated companies. Among them is a Canadian firm that specializes in convenience stores.
The price you see at the pump is misleading as to profit. An enormous chunk of the recent increase in gas prices is simply the decline of the US dollar, that being directly the result of current White House policy. Any area-to-area differences will be due to local taxes, local environment laws, and the pricing policies of the company that runs those particular stations.