Picture a basic forecourt.
Fuel pumps are arranged in rows under a canopy. There’s basic signage with fuel prices and advertisements. A convenience retailer is nearby for customers to purchase the essentials.
While none of that is going away, the industry experts interviewed for this story say the forecourt could include futuristic elements:
Imagine carbon-fiber canopies provide solar power, use motion-powered lighting and have LED lights. Wind turbines power the fueling station. A water system is built on recycled rainwater. AI recognizes a car when it pulls up and knows exactly what kind of at-the-pump multimedia interaction the customer would like. Machine learning directs the flow of traffic and tells customers what the wait times are. Signage is three-dimensional. A fueling station allows customers to order food from inside… at the pump.
According to experts, that’s all possible—and in the not-too-distant future.
In a 2020 paper (“The Forecourt of the Future”) for management consultant group Arthur D. Little, Daniel Monzon and Carlo Stella wrote, “The traditional forecourt model is at its inevitable end.” The two posited that EVs, autonomous cars, data analytics and the Internet of Things are part of a host of emerging technologies that will shake up the classic fuel-station experience.
While that imagined future isn’t here just yet, you can already see major changes happening. A fuel retailer in London completely removed its traditional gas pumps in favor of an all-electric forecourt. A South American retailer changed its forecourt to be entirely geared toward motorcycles. And sustainability, largely driven by younger generations, is becoming more of a premium.
In some places, the forecourt is being treated more like an experience. A retailer in Europe turned its forecourt into a kind of conveyor belt—cars drive to the retailer, an employee attaches the fuel nozzle to the inlet and the “belt” slowly moves the car through the forecourt while the fueling takes place—which, while not the most efficient idea, has driven customer numbers up because it’s fun. Multimedia programs at the pump (and the quality of the monitors) are becoming more important. And retailers are learning that signage can be fun and interactive.
Plus, the pumps themselves are getting an upgrade. Technology inside the pumps is making the forecourt smarter and safer—and more customer-friendly by prioritizing speed, experience and ease. And things such as contactless payments are changing the customer experience.
So where should retailers start?
Neil Giles, the creative director of U.K.-based brand consultancy firm Circle, said his firm works with the client to define the design brief and understand their objectives and priorities. Are they looking for something particularly convenient that’s easy to get in and out of? Are they hoping to create a one-of-a-kind experience? Are they hoping to prioritize the use of sustainable materials?
“Functionality and safety requirements are broadly similar across the markets we work in,” Giles said. “Innovation and sustainability are important aspects of the brief, but these mean different things to different clients…. Sustainability ideas are layered into our design process and, I believe, will become increasingly important to all our clients.”
The key, he said, is for retailers to consider the overall impact of their brand and offer. “The combination of all the parts should work in harmony”—that means the overall appearance of the sites; the distinctive architectural design; the way the brand talks to its customers; the range of services and products offered; and even where items such as the placement of the trash cans and windshield cleaning stations.
What makes a well-designed forecourt to Giles?
“A compelling combination of fuel and nonfuel offers that encourages customers to use the forecourt throughout the day,” he said. “As a customer, I want the fundamentals of fuel and EV, but I also want to be able to get a good coffee and something to eat in an environment that I want to spend some time in.”
Giles said forecourt design has seen greater innovation in recent years, but he thinks more change—particularly with the rise of EVs—is on the horizon. That will mean that retailers need to devote more space to alternative energy pumps and could play a role in what the multimedia systems at the pumps could look like, too, given that customers will be in their cars for longer wait times.
He sees “very innovative” sites in the U.S. but also looks to Middle East–based brands such as Emarat, ADNOC and ENOC for inspiration regarding forward-thinking design and the materials used.
He’s excited to see what’s next.
“Material options are constantly changing, which can be an area of good innovation for fuel retailers,” Giles said. “Some, like LEDs, are ubiquitous, but new materials are coming to market all the time. Material options can help support the delivery of sustainability goals, and where retailers work across different markets, material choice can help with regional implementation strategies.”
There are some general rules of thumb all retailers can play by. He said, “They are no longer ‘oil brands’ and must express a vibrant and unique character…. An effective modular solution can help control production costs, help with multimarket roll-out and enable effective maintenance of assets.”
“What will customers want from their forecourts in five years?” he said. “We have worked with many clients who take differing views, so common trends are still being formed.”
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Retail, design and brand consultancy firm Campbell Rigg recently worked with Gulf Oil International to develop its forecourts. The firm proposed that the retailer “benchmark the sector”—comparing the performance and features of designs in the convenience industry and identifying best practices, trends and areas of improvement.
For example, Campbell Rigg found that the surge in EV adoption will offer retailers a huge amount of flexibility because they can rethink their design and that innovative canopy designs can help customers look toward the future.
The firm founder’s and CEO, Campbell Rigg, said he works with retailers to “orient toward the future while also paying tribute to the past.”
“We’re discovering how retailers are redesigning forecourt formats to suit the changing energy needs,” Rigg said. “(That means) rethinking canopy designs, brand identities and c-stores with the modern consumer in mind.”
But he said it’s not always as easy as retailers want it to be.
“The challenge is to update a roadside forecourt identity while delivering an innovative yet highly recognizable solution.”
He continued: “The key is combining a forward-looking market segmentation with a more precise understanding of the needs of customers and a brand’s identity.”
Rigg constantly thinks about how EVs and new fuel mixes will change the design. He foresees electrification leading to partnerships among forecourt retailers, carmakers and energy providers. He adds that “hydrogen has the potential to become a vital part of the transport mix in a low-carbon future, requiring players to reinvent their business models to account for new infrastructure requirements (around fuel production, storage and distribution).
“Production of hydrogen uses renewable sources of energy such as water and is a sustainable source of energy. As a result, fuel cell hydrogen vehicles can travel up to 700 kilometers [435 miles] on a single tank and can refuel in a few minutes—(and that) could be the future.”
Another trend affecting forecourt design is the increased priority of c-store retailers on their food and beverage offerings. Riggs said forecourt signage and branding have improved and have become more of a focal point. Circle’s Giles added that his firm is seeing retailers advertise and showcase its inviting café spaces so that customers can see the offering when they drive up to the forecourt.
Terry Monday, the chief strategy officer for visual communication organization The Imagine Group, said she thinks retailers could take a page from the entertainment industry and go big with their forecourt signage.
“If you look at the out-of-home market, which is really billboards, bus shelters and all of those things, they tend to be pretty flat,” Monday said. “But there’s so much fun that you can have with those with that signage. For example, what if a (forecourt) had a three-dimensional coffee cup coming off the billboard?”
She said such a thing wouldn’t necessarily be inexpensive, but redesigning the signage and making it more interactive costs “a lot less than people think.” Monday also said that, in the forecourt, c-stores can play with organic shapes and colorful lighting to create a better experience. And as technology continues to improve, doing so becomes cheaper over time.
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The pumps themselves are also getting a design update—although it may not be as noticeable. As retailers continue to meet customers where they are, prevailing trends in the pumps in the forecourt are contactless payments, cloud technology and security.
Bob Danford, strategic accounts manager at Allied Electronics, said the key trend he’s seeing is “definitely to minimize, if not eliminate hardware, through virtualization (because) forecourt control is burdensome. There are many devices on-site that require constant polling and management.”
Those include the dispensers, card readers, payment terminals, price signs and car-wash controllers that use legacy protocols that are decades old. Danford said, “The challenge has been: How do you take these legacy protocols and convert them into IP [internet protocol] and send them on their merry way to the cloud? If virtualization of the forecourt was easy, somebody would have done it by now, believe me, because that’s what everybody wants.”
And while virtualization might be the goal, Allied Electronics sees other trends, too. According to Akhileshwar Padala, the company’s head of engineering, AI remains top of mind and is being developed to assist with forecourt payments and security. Sustainability is also showing up at the pump; technology is being introduced that can reduce retailers’ electric footprint with new code modulation.
And safety and security remain top of mind at the pump. For example, Allied Electronics sells a device that, the moment it detects a breach in the fuel pulsar system, will kill communications to the nozzle.
“The virtue of AI-based technology is that there’s a very good opportunity for developers to get (the technology) into the system and monitor the customer behavior at the pump and alert the cashier so that they can see if there’s a skimmer,” Padala said. “So suspicious-behavior patterns… is where we can see the development is headed.”
At the moment, Danford doesn’t see EV technology as completely integrated—“You swipe the card at an EV pump, and it’s a different experience than a pay-at-pump,” he said—but that will change in the coming years as retailers work to align more with the experience customers have today.
Elaine P. Kanak, the chief marketing officer at manufacturing company Gilbarco Veeder-Root, said customer expectations are changing the at-the-pump experience. She said: “Consumers are increasingly expecting to be recognized. They expect loyalty and personalization. They also expect convenience and a frictionless experience. They want to be able to pay in any different way that works quickly and well. And they want kind of a seamless customer experience.”
She also sees a big opportunity at the pump with EVs, adding that “there’s a tremendous opportunity when it comes to sort of the mixed-energy future we’re moving toward.” The company recently announced its turnkey Konect system, a fully integrated, sitewide suite that delivers seamless EV charging and has been developed to maximize profitability.
“There’s an opportunity for retailers to really convey what their message is for customers,” Kanak said. “At the pump, you’re pretty confident that there are some human eyeballs there. So what we see is that in these big-screen shots, there’s a tremendous opportunity to connect with a broader audience of people who might be walking by the store… and to monetize some of that screen time.”
She added, “We’re seeing a lot of retailers who are very interested in having their own branded content, and being able to display that to customers and drive in-store sales to the food service is important.”
Gilbarco Veeder-Root is trying to increase customization at the pump. It recently announced it’s working on at-the-pump ordering because food service is “increasingly important in this space,” Kanak said. “We’re introducing a way for customers to be able to place their food order for that pizza, or whatever it is, while they’re fueling up, and then they can be in and out of the store even faster.”
Gilbarco Veeder-Root is also working on improved screens that were designed for boats (so they should work perfectly even in extreme weather) and offer a higher-quality viewing experience. The company wants retailers (or third parties) to be able to create customized at-the-pump content, and that level of customization extends to branding and appearance, too.
“Every retailer is going to have a unique strategy and brand message,” Kanak said. “And those are going to come to life in different ways. We just want to make sure our retailers have the tools they need to do what’s right for their audience.”
One more forecourt area Kanak sees as a trend: the car as a wallet. “There are some providers out there that are looking at how a vehicle can be used as a payment device,” she said, likening that experience to how customers can pay with their phones or watches in certain stores.
“What we’re seeing is that some brands or specifics are being customized to fit the unique needs for that brand and then production,” she said. “Our solutions are designed to be sizable or offer retailers flexibility to tailor their experience to their needs.… They might have different equipment or different layouts in different locations, so we will make that seamless and easy for them to manage.”
So as experts suggest, the future might not be here yet, but it’s close.
A version of this article originally appeared here.
