Local News

WJZ.COM Editor's Picks

Celebrity Mug Shots More

Health News You Can Use Celebrities As Superheroes WJZ's Pumpwatch Section Entertainers From Maryland

• May 9, 2008 6:39 am US/Eastern
• Digg | Facebook | E-mail

  Close WindowE-mail This Page

  Car Dealers Use Gas Deal To Promote Car Sales

  Required fields are marked with an asterisk(*)

  ---

  • Recipient E-mail:* 
  • • Your Name:* 
    • Your E-mail:* 
  • Add a Message:
  •   Send me a copy of this e-mail.

  • Type the characters in this picture:* Click here to refresh with new letters

  ---

  The information you provide will be used only to send the requested e-mail and will not be used to send any other e-mail communications. Read more in our Privacy Policy

  Send E-mail

  | Print

Car Dealers Use Gas Deal To Promote Car Sales

Reporting
Mary Bubala

The seemingly unstoppable price surge at the pump brought consumers a new record high Thursday.

Now some are getting quite creative to try to keep the cost down.

Mary Bubala reports auto manufacturers are using gasoline discounts to promote car sales while AAA advises drivers to conserve because there's no end in sight to rising prices.

The ceilings literally comes off gasoline prices with each new day. Nationally, the average gallon costs $3.65. That's up three cents over last week.

In Maryland it's $3.63 with the same three cent jump taking place overnight. It's all because a barrel of oil is now a record $124.

"This is nearly the fifth day of record high prices from when they were a low of $112 last week after the federal government cut their rate," said Christine Delise with AAA Mid-Atlantic.

Chrysler Motors has come up with a gasoline based sales promotion along with rebates.

The incentive offers buyers of certain cars 500-700 gallons of gasoline at a guaranteed $2.99 a gallon, $1.65 less than Monday's prices.

"It'll be a Visa card or Mastercard. They'll go into a gas station. They'll pay for gas. If it's $5 a gallon such as diesel at the end of the month when they get their credit statement, it'll say $2.99 a gallon. They'll get a credit," said Mike Meagher with Len Stoler Domestic Dealers.

The incentive is enough to lure Paul Johnson into Len Stoler's Westminster Chrysler Dealership. He says it was an offer he couldn't ignore.

"Up popped this ad for the $2.99 for gas. I'm like, that looks good. It wasn't exactly the reason I came in here. Wasn't for that, but it certainly did catch my attention," said Johnson.

About the best advice AAA can offer is for drivers to conserve as much as possible, drive less, consolidate trips, lighten the load in your car and keep tires inflated.

"We just have no reason why. It's just the same reasons we've been hearing all year. That investor mania...that investors see this as an attractive investment, crude oil," said Delise.

The auto sales promotion runs for a year, but there's no telling how much longer gasoline prices will continue to rise.

(© MMVIII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)