RETAIL OUTLET

A filling station, petrol bunk or petrol pump is a facility which sells fuel and usually lubricants for
motor vehicles. The most common fuels sold today are gasoline, diesel fuel, and electric energy.
Filling stations that sell only electric energy are also known as charging stations. Fuel dispensers
are used to pump petrol/gasoline, diesel, lubricants, auto LPG, CNG or other types of fuel into
vehicles and calculate the financial cost of the fuel transferred to the vehicle.

Fig.1 An overview of Retail Outlet

MAJOR DOWNSTREAM PLAYERS IN INDIA

Fig.2 Logos of Major Downstream players in India

Out of these, Indian Oil, Hindustan Petroleum and Bharat Petroleum come under Public Sector
and Shell, Essar 7 Reliance are the major Private players in India. Since it is not Financially
Feasible for the CNG and auto LPG companies such as MGL, IGL to set up an own retail outlet
they can be seen as a part of the public sector retail outlets. It is also a notable fact that some
of these downstream players have their foot planted in Upstream & Midstream also.
DESIGN & FUNCTION
Most filling stations are built in a similar manner, with most of the fueling installation
underground, pump machines in the forecourt and a point of service inside a building. Single or
multiple fuel tanks are usually deployed underground. Local regulations and environmental
concerns may require a different method, with some stations storing their fuel in container
tanks, entrenched surface tanks or unprotected fuel tanks deployed on the surface. Fuel is
usually offloaded from a tanker truck into the tanks through a separate valve, located on the
filling station's perimeter. Fuel from the tank travels to the dispenser pumps through
underground pipes. For every fuel tank, direct access must be available at all times. Most tanks
can be accessed through a service canal directly from the forecourt.
INDIAN RETAIL SCENARIO-NUMBER OF RETAIL OUTLETS

YEAR 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019

NUMBER OF
OUTLETS
North 17185 18070 19206 19206 20824
North East 1303 1353 1410 1492 1547
East 7118 7476 7743 7930 8152
West 12475 13356 14331 15134 15618
South 15337 15935 16905 17828 18484
All India 53418 56190 59595 62585 64625
Total

Number of Retail Outlets

70000
65000
60000
55000
50000
45000
40000
35000
30000
25000
20000
2015 2016 2017 2018 2019

Fig 3: A graph on number of Retail Outlets in India from 2015-2019

As it is evident from the above graph and table that the number of retail outlets in India has
increased over the year from 53418 to 64625 from the year 2015 to 2019 respectively.