With gas prices hovering above $5 a gallon, wireless carrier T-Mobile turned back the clock and rolled back pump prices Tuesday to $1.99 per gallon at one Chicago Shell station.
Decked out for the day in a T-Mobile magenta makeover, the station at 4357 W. Belmont Ave. on the city’s Northwest Side offered the $1.99-per-gallon price on any grade fuel, to any vehicle short of a boat, semi, RV or vocational truck. No gas can fill-ups were allowed either.
The promotion ran from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., with hundreds of cars lined up to fill up at a significant discount.
The wireless giant pumped up similar one-day promotions at select Shell stations in Los Angeles and Houston as well to celebrate the 10th anniversary of T-Mobile Tuesdays. The weekly program, administered through the T-Mobile app, offers customers a 10 cents-per-gallon discount at all Shell stations, as well as other perks.
“We wanted to go big this time for our anniversary and then open it up to everybody,” said Katie Frey, a T-Mobile spokesperson. “We know that gas is a line item on many people’s budgets these days, so hopefully this is good news.”
Gas prices have been skyrocketing since the Trump administration launched military strikes against Iran on Feb. 28. Iran effectively blocked the Strait of Hormuz in response, cutting down global oil supplies. Crude oil prices have doubled, raising prices at the pump across the U.S.
In Chicago, the average price of regular gas is $5.02 per gallon, up from $3.81 on the same date last year, according to AAA. Premium gas averages $6.17 per gallon, up from $4.90 last year.
For a typical 16-gallon U.S. vehicle, the $1.99-per-gallon price represents a fill-up savings of $50 to $70, depending on fuel grade, which made the T-Mobile promotion Tuesday worth the drive for many Chicagoans — even if they had to burn some fuel to get there.
T-Mobile chose the $1.99-per-gallon price, because that’s what gas cost when they launched the weekly Tuesday discount promotion for customers in 2016. While T-Mobile is hoping the 10th anniversary promotion will attract new customers to sign on with the wireless carrier, the $1.99-per-gallon gas price was open to every driver, regardless of cellular affiliation, Frey said.
Vehicles lined up all morning at the busy Shell station at the corner of Belmont and Kostner avenues, with cars stretching for four blocks at the peak.
The first car arrived at 6:30 a.m., with about 50 vehicles in a queue snaking around the block by the time the discounted pumps opened at 9:30 a.m. Nearly 100 cars had filled up by 11 a.m., with dozens more still waiting behind them.
The typical wait time to fill up was running about an hour and a half throughout the promotion.
Maria Kozeluh, a real estate agent who lives in the Roscoe Village neighborhood, was planning to fill up her Toyota RAV4 with cheaper gas in the suburbs when she heard about the T-Mobile promotion. She detoured to the Shell station at 9:30 a.m., and waited in line for more than 1½ hours before finally making it to the pump as the 109th customer to fill up.
“I really think it’s worth it,” Kozeluh said. “I’m glad I didn’t drink a lot of water and I’m just a little late to get to my destination, but it’s okay.”
Meanwhile, Angela Thompson was simply driving by the station Tuesday morning when she noticed the $1.99 price on the magenta-colored corner gas sign. She got in line at about 8 a.m. and filled up her Chevrolet Trax SUV two hours later.
“I’m actually from Chatham, but I dropped my daughter off at work and saw the price,” said Thompson, 58.
The promotion was limited to one vehicle per person while the gas supply — and drivers’ patience — held out. Both made it through the five-hour promotion, with 366 cars pumping 4,716 gallons of gas, according to Frey.
While drivers invested a collective 550 hours idling in their cars in the gas lines, they saved about $14,000 for their efforts, Frey said.
“They waited in line, but they got a good deal,” Frey said.
rchannick@chicagotribune.com
The Tribune’s Josh Boland contributed.
