Greenpeace. Closing BP stations

Yet again[1], Greenpeace get it wrong. Being neither Green nor Peaceful.

Today they've been targeting[current] small businesses that are franchised out from BP.

They have been basically preventing customers from filling up at BP franchises by illegally blocking off entrances, trespassing then turning off the petrol pumps by the emergency switches and, unbelievably, tampering with those switches with a screwdriver to remove the physical switch.


Two things immediately spring to mind (beyond the utter stupidity of tampering with the safety system):

 1) BP couldn't give a fig about this in any monetary capacity. It's well known that there is little money to be made selling petrol to end users in the UK since the vast majority of the difference between pump price and raw cost ends up in the government's coffers

 2) Most of the profit in petrol stations comes from the concessions sold in the shop. The sweets, the sandwiches, the maps, and so on. BP don't see any of those since they're run by small businesses/families, and it is those small businesses/families that Greenpeace are hurting.

Green? Hardly. All anyone who wants petrol is going to do is go to Tesco or Shell or Morrisons down the road.
Peaceful? Trespass - nope. Tampering with critical safety systems - nope.

They really have no idea....


[1] http://advertisingbollocks.blogspot.com/2010/04/greenpeace.html